^'%,'%.<^ 



^LIBRARY OF CONGRESS.; 

# ^ 

I [SMITHSONIAN DEPOSIT.] f 

J UNITED STATES OP AMERICA J 



b V 



ROME, 

CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL: 
SKETCHES 

OF ITS 

RELIGIOUS MONUMENTS AND ECCLESIASTICAL HIERARCHY, 

WITH 

NOTICES OF THE JESUITS AND THE INQUISITION. 



BY 1^'''4b'^SANCTIS, D.D., 

FOEMEELY CUEATE OF THE MAGDALENE, PROFESSOR OF THEOLOGY IN THE 
ROMAN UNIYEESITY, AND QUALLFICATOR AT THE LNQtJISITION. 






NEW YORK: 

HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, 
FRANKLIN SQUARE, 

1856. 



Ife- ft<CO 



Ths Library 

OP CONGRBSS 
^ASaiNGltJN 



vSt5 



Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year one thousand 
eight hundred and fifty -six, by 

Harper & Brothers, 

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the Southern District 
of New York. 



ADVERTISEMENT. 



The stranger, visiting those localities in the city of 
Rome which tradition has invested with a strong re- 
ligious interest, finds himself, to a great degree, de- 
pendent on the explanations given by monks and 
priests who exhibit them for his impressions of the 
authenticity and worth of the monuments of ecclesias- 
tical antiquity there displayed. The guide-books, pre- 
pared with a special view to sale in Roman Catholic 
countries, avoiding all conflict with established notions, 
afford him little help in arriving at the truth. It has 
been therefore thought that, not only for persons who 
are about visiting that city, but also for many who 
have already done so, such a work as the present, hav- 
ing reference chiefly to the ecclesiastical antiquities, 
institutions, and ceremonies of Rome, as contemplated 
from an enlightened Christian point of view, may pos- 
sess considerable value. Its author, a man of no ordi- 
nary talents, was formerly a parish priest in that city, 
and by his learning, piety, and wide influence secured 
the high esteem of the Papal court, and filled several 
ofiices of important trust. A convert to the Protestant 
faith, he has for some years past labored as a devoted 
minister of the Waldensian, or primitive Italian Church 



IV ADVEETISEMENT. 

at Turin, Sardinia. Within a few weeks he has been 
chosen professor in one of the Swiss Universities. 
Aside, therefore, from abundant corroborative evidence, 
it is believed that the opportunities of acquaintance 
with things as they are in Rome, and the unimpeach- 
able integrity of this author, are sufficient vouchers 
for the correctness of statements and the sincerity of 
views advanced in this little work. 



PREFACE. 



It is at Rome, and not elsewhere, that Popery should 
be studied. Books give but a false and incomplete 
idea of it : in them we meet with only the Popery of 
the Middle Ages, or the poetical Popery of Chateau- 
briand. As developed in Protestant countries, we find 
the system of Bossuet — a Popery less superstitious, 
and perhaps less intolerant, until, at last, it becomes 
the ruling power. 

From the period of the Council of Trent, Roman 
Catholicism has identified itself with Jesuitism. That 
unscrupulous order has better known how to clothe 
itself, when occasion required, with new forms, and to 
give a convenient elasticity to its favorite maxim, that 
the end is every thing ^ and all the means to attain it 
are good. But by depending on the skillful tactics of 
the " Society of Jesus," the court of Rome has been 
constrained to yield to its ascendency, confide her des- 
tiny to its hands, and permit it to direct her interests, 
and of this control Jesuitism has availed itself in the 
most absolute way. It has constituted the powerful 
mainspring, more or less concealed, of the whole Papal 
machinery. 

To obtain a correct idea of the immorality of the 
Roman clergy^ one must have lived, as did the author 



VI PREFACE. 

of these letters, for many years in one of those places 
where priests or monks are gathered. There only is 
it possible to become acquainted with the habits of 
idleness, the vain or guilty conversations and pastimes, 
the vicious habits in which they engage ; and as re- 
gards the immorality that exists in the nunneries of 
Rome, it would be necessary to have been called upon, 
as he was, in his character of preacher and spiritual 
director at many of those houses, to hear confessions ; 
to read, as his duties required him to do, in the judi- 
cial records of the vicariate, and in those of the " con- 
gregation" of the bishops and the regular clergy, the 
numerous instances of the public disorders of priests, 
monks, and nuns. We do not say that there were no 
exceptions, but it was not on this side that the greater 
number of cases appeared. To understand the re- 
ligion of Rome as a religion of money, one must visit 
Rome, and proceed to the ''Datario," where all the 
bishoprics of the world are for sale ; where the prices 
of ecclesiastical benefices and matrimonial dispensa- 
tions are bargained for; or to the ojice of briefs^ 
where all other dispensations are for sale. For such 
details, we refer to a statement published by the au- 
thor of these letters three or four years since, contain- 
ing a calculation of ecclesiastical revenues in the lit- 
tle Roman State. The perquisites of the clergy alone 
amount to more than seventeen miUions of francs, not 
including the property called ecclesiastical, the pro- 
ceeds of the '^Datario," the briefs, indulgences, bene- 
fices, etc. With regard to the doctrines of Popery, 
we should seek them, not in the writings of Wiseman 
and Bossuet, nor in any works prepared with a view 



PREFACE. Vll 

to allure Protestants ; we must go to Rome itself, and 
there we shall find two doctrines — the one official^ and 
the other actual or practical. Thus Bossuet, for ex- 
ample, pretends that the Roman Church does not pro- 
hibit the reading of the Bible, and yet you will see 
this book put in the '' Index" among the most dan- 
gerous of writings, and you will find all the Popes in 
their encyclical letters fulminating against it, without 
even excepting the New Testament as translated by 
Martini, Archbishop of Florence. Bossuet denies that 
in the Roman Church crosses, images, or relics are wor- 
shiped ; but go to Rome, and there you will see the 
Pope himself prostrated in prayer before crosses, rel- 
ics, and images. It is at Rome only that Popery 
Jesuitized^ so to speak, can be known in its essential 
form ; it is at the office of the Secretary of State, at 
the " chancery of extraordinary ecclesiastical affairs," 
that this whole mystery of iniquity unveils itself. 
There may be perceived the artifices employed to gain 
over all the kingdoms of the earth, not to Jesus Christ, 
but to the Pope ; the conspiracies organized or toler- 
ated for the attainment of this end. There may be 
witnessed the meetings at the General of the Jesuits, 
where news from the whole world is brought, and 
where the reverend fathers rub their hands with de- 
light when they learn the new conquests of infidelity ; 
where they invoke universal disorder, universal irre- 
ligion, so that the way may be opened to the ravages 
and the triumphs of the Popish system. 

The love of art, luxury, and sensuality is turned to 
account by the Popery of Jesuitism with a wonderful 
shrewdness. The Jesuits know full well that man is 



Vlll PREFACE. 

carnal ; that the natural man receiveth not the things 
of the spirit, neither can he know them, because thej 
are spiritually discerned. Thus thev have substituted 
for the worship in spirit and truth taught by Scripture 
a material, sensual, and lying worship. Their policy 
proclaims liberty of the conscience and religious free- 
dom in those countries where they can profit by the 
possession of those rights, but it denounces them with 
the utmost bitterness at home. 

Our preface would be lengthened into a book should 
we attempt to enumerate all the monstrosities con- 
tained in this combination of Popery and Jesuitism. 
It was the author's design to enlarge considerably the 
plan of this correspondence by including a more com- 
plete consideration of the Romish controversy, and a 
more extended analysis of the monuments, ceremonies, 
and usages of Eomanism, but the epistolary form is 
ill adapted to such a work, and he has confined him- 
self to the points noticed in the following letters. 

In view of the facts quoted and the opinions ex- 
pressed by the author in this correspondence, the read- 
er is justified in inquiring from what sources he has 
gained a knowledge of them, and what confidence they 
merit. To this question the author replies openly that 
he is a Roman by birth. He lived nearly twenty-two 
years in one of those establishments where there resided 
a certain number of priests who bore close relations 
with the Jesuits. He himself, in the early part of his 
career, was among their warmest friends. He regarded 
them as the supporters of religion until he became 
aware of what religion itself was. For fifteen years 
he occupied the confessional. For eight years he was 



PREFACE. IX 

the curate of one of the principal parishes of Rome, 
the Magdalene. Being esteemed by his ecclesiastical 
superiors, he was often intrusted with important mis- 
sions. He was called upoi^to visit most of the mon- 
asteries in Rome as preacher and confessor. He was 
Professor of Theology, Emeritus Censor of the Acade- 
my of Theology in the Roman University, and a mem- 
ber of many other academies. He was chosen by Car- 
dinal Micara, dean of the Holy College and a man uni- 
versally respected, to examine his clergy. Finally, as 
regards the Inquisition, he filled during ten years the 
ofiice of qualificatory that is, theologian of the Roman 
Inquisition. There could exist in that institution no 
secret with which he was not acquainted. He has 
visited the prisons, received denunciations, confessed 
culprits, prepared all the papers necessary for the judg- 
ment of cases upon which he was called to give his 
opinion. He speaks, therefore, of all these things, not 
from hearsay or report, but from actual experience. 

Perhaps the reader will inquire his motives for aban- 
doning so brilliant a position on the road to the high- 
est honors, and exchanging it for the humble career of 
a simple preacher of the Gospel — for a position that 
has not always placed him above want. The author 
will only reply that he preferred the glory which comes 
from God to that given by man, eternal good to mate- 
rial wealth, peace of conscience with Jesus to the peace 
of the world. This is the secret of his conversion. 
How many years the combat lasted, how his eyes be- 
came opened to the light — this is what he will narrate 
later, perhaps, when he may judge it useful to the 
cause to which he has devoted his life. For the pres- 

A 2 - 



X PKEFACE. 

ent, he will speak only of that cause which alone has 
induced him to take up the pen. 

To justify the motives alleged for his own sincerity, 
the author should, perhaps, add that he never had occa- 
sion to make the slightest complaint of his superiors. 
They have always surrounded him with their esteem and 
consideration until his conversion. His conduct might 
possibly bear the stamp of ingratitude, were it not for 
this word of Peter (Acts, v., 29), which justifies him 
fully, ''We ought to obey God rather than men." 

The framework of these letters is fictitious ; the 
three principal individuals represent the three doctrin- 
al systems brought upon the stage. Catholicism^ sin- 
cere and honest, is represented by ^'^ Ahhe; it is the 
ideal of that class of students who abound in Rome, 
and who are trained to go forth on propagandist mis- 
sions in Protestant countries. Evangelical religion is 
represented by the Waldensian Pasquali^ and M. Man- 
son is an honest specimen of the Puseyite or TractOn 
Wa^i, with whose opinions and tendencies toward the 
Church of Rome every one is acquainted. 

As for the other persons who make their appearance 
in these letters, they are actual and real ; their por- 
traits are true ; to each of them the author could afiix 
a proper name. The same is true as regards the cir- 
cumstances and incidents mentioned. Evidence of the 
most unquestionable character might, were it necessa- 
ry, be adduced to demonstrate the reality of them all. 
The author has also in his possession all the original 
documents relating to the various offices of trust he 
has filled, and the missions upon which he has been 
employed. He has the certificates of his irreproach- 



PREFACE. XI 

able conduct, given him up to his departure from 
Rome. 

Finally, for the benefit of those who might be sur- 
prised to find that he should have penetrated so far 
into the mysteries of Jesuitism, the author will say 
that he has three times performed the exercises of 
Saint Ignatius, mentioned in the first letter, each at 
an interval of several years : the first of these at the 
period of his early enthusiasm for the Jesuits, the sec- 
ond when the study of the Word had begun to raise 
doubts in his mind, and the third with the design of 
a critical examination, to explore and fathom this mys- 
tery of iniquity, and to be better armed for its attack. 



ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

FIRST LETTER. 

HENKY TO EUGENE. 

Rome, November, 1846. 

My dear Eugene, — ^You have good reason to com- 
plain of my neglect in failing to write to you. Alas ! 
what could I do ? In my term of study I had not a 
moment to dispose of; but, now that we are entering 
upon the autumn vacation, I shall write you so much 
and so often that perhaps your patience may be ex- 
hausted. 

You ask me to tell you what I think of the new 
Pope. You know that I am but little acquainted with 
politics, that I live a very retired life, and that my in- 
tercourse with others is limited to discussions with the 
good Jesuit fathers, my teachers, my '' directors,"* and 
my friends. You will understand from this that you 
have come to the wrong person for information about 
what you wish to know. However, I may say that 
our good fathers assure me that the concessions made 
by the new Pope will eventually procure great injury 
to our most holy religion. You are a Protestant, ed- 
ucated in the pernicious doctrine oifree inquiry. You 

* The " director" is the spiritual adviser or confessor of a devout 
Roman Catholic. 



16 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

will smile, perhaps, at these fears ; but if, like me, you 
had been so happy as to have been born in the bosom 
of the Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman Church, you 
would be aware that the religion of Jesus Christ is a 
yoke (a light yoke, indeed — St. Matthew, ch. xi., 30 — 
but still a yoke) that should not be made too easy — that 
should weigh upon the neck, and constrain, lovingly 
indeed, but effectually and positively ; for to yield much 
liberty to the people is to throw off the bridle from the 
colt's neck. The Holy Father, by permitting all those 
"liberals," who are so many devouring wolves, to re- 
turn into his States, appears to be committing a great 
piece of imprudence, and imperiling the flock of Christ 
confided to his care. 

But, my good friend, as for myself, I am occupied 
with one thing only, the salvation of my soul. My 
teachers seem to be satisfied with my progress, and I 
hope by next year to return to my country. Oh ! if 
I could only clasp you in my arms as a brother in 
Christ ! But I do not despair ; you are good, your 
heart is right, and I have great hopes of you. Mean- 
while, I am going to relate to you my experience for 
some time past ; and you will see how unjustly the 
good fathers of the Company of Jesus are calumniated 
by many. 

In the autumn vacation I was fortunate enough to 
be admitted to practice the spiritual exercises of St. 
Ignatius in the religious house of St. Eusebius. There 
were fifty of us belonging to the ecclesiastical order, 
among whom were Cardinal B., four prelates, a good 
many monks, a few curates, and all the rest were priests, 
with the exception of myself, who had but received 



EXERCISES OF ST. IGNATIUS. 17 

the tonsure.* We all entered on the 22d of Oc- 
tober. 

The church and the convent of St. Eusebius were 
given to the Father Jesuits by Leon XII. They are 
situated on the Esquiline HiU, and cover a great part 
of the site of the ancient baths of Gordian, of which a 
few vestiges are still to be seen. The convent, or re- 
ligious house, was destined by these good fathers to 
serve as a retreat for such persons as desired to prac- 
tice the exercises of St. Ignatius, and at different pe- 
riods of every year it is filled with pious persons, who 
devote ten days to these exercises. 

There is nothing like this in your religion, which is 
the very reason why I wish to describe it to you in de- 
tail and exactness, so that you may be able to have an 
idea of it, and to j)erceive the precious resources we 
possess, and that you Protestants are deprived of. 

Eight days, at least, before the day fixed for admis- 
sion, the candidate must procure a ticket; for these 
good fathers desire to acquaint themselves beforehand, 
by means of good Christian persons, respecting aU that 
concerns the individual who seeks to enter upon these 
holy exercises, and this with the sole view of ascer- 
taining the best method in which to direct his con- 
science. Hardly have you passed the threshold of the 
sacred house when two fathers come forward to greet 
you with religious eagerness. A domestic takes your 
baggage, and conducts you to the chamber prepared 
for you. Already you find your name written on your 

* By the tonsure is meant the ceremony of shaving off the hair 
from the crown of the head, performed when persons are admitted 
to holy orders of the Roman Catholic Church. 



18 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

door in large letters, upon a card fastened in an ele- 
gant little frame. The chamber is simply furnished. 
A tolerably soft bed, a little table with every thing 
necessary for writing, two chairs, a prie-Dieu, a vase 
of holy water, a crucifix, and a printed list of the reg- 
ulations hanging against the wall — this constitutes all 
the furniture. 

About half an hour after entering, one of the fathers 
pays you a visit, and seeks, by judicious questions, to 
reach the motives which have led you to visit this re- 
treat. This he does with the pious aim of becoming 
better qualified to direct your conscience. This visit 
terminated, the sound of a bell calls each one to the 
chapel, situated in the centre of the building, where 
four corridors, into which the cells open, terminate. 
This chapel is consecrated to the Holy Virgin, and on 
the altar you see her seated, handing to St. Ignatius 
the book of Spiritual Exercises. In the middle of 
the chapel, on a green carpet stretched over the pave- 
ment, you see a large metal crucifix, which all upon 
entering adore by kneeling and bending down to kiss. 
Father Z., seated in an arm-chair upon a step of the 
altar, commences the introductory discourse upon this 
text, from Mark, vi., 31 : Yeiiite seorsxim in desertum 
locum^ et requiescite pusillum : " Come ye yourselves 
apart into a desert place, and rest a while." He dem- 
onstrates the absolute necessity for a Christian, and 
still more for an ecclesiastic, to retire often into soli- 
tude to practice holy spiritual exercises, because Jesus 
Christ himself did as much during the forty days he 
passed in the desert before he began to preach ; and 
he commanded the apostles to do likewise, which the 



EXERCISES OF ST. IGNATIUS. 19 

text cited plainly proves. This is the reason for which 
St. Ignatius instituted the exercises, and the Holy 
Church recommends them strongly. Passing thence 
to the exposition of the rules, in the observance of 
which it is alone possible to reap great advantage by 
means of these exercises, Father Z. continued his re- 
marks in the same line of thought until the bell gave 
notice of the close of the discourse. While it lasted, 
several worthy fathers, full of zeal for the greatest glory 
of God and the good of souls, made a tour through all 
the chambers, and examined carefully the baggage of 
each individual ; not, of course, for the purpose of ab- 
stracting any thing therefrom, but simply to find out 
what papers, books, and other objects are in the posses- 
sion of those who have entered upon the holy exercises, 
with a view, again, to be governed by any such dis- 
coveries in the future direction of their consciences. 
If they find a valise that is locked, the fathers' lock- 
smith, who is provided with a number of skeleton 
keys, &c., destined to this use, opens it forthwith, and 
closes it again after the visit. 

The sermon ended, each returns to his chamber, 
where he finds a small pewter lamp, with a single wick, 
on his ''prie-Dieu," beside a little book containing a 
synopsis of the sermon just heard. This happens 
after each lecture. You will always find, on return- 
ing to your cell, a new libretto containing the abridg- 
ment of the last sermon. Half an hour later all pro- 
ceed to supper, and thence return to their chambers. 
This is the time which the good fathers devote to vis- 
iting their guests and, conversing with them on sacred 
themes. The day ends with an examination of the 



20 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

conscience, made in common in the chapel, under the 
direction of the fathers. 

The following day is entirely devoted to meditation 
and to the explanation of the great maxim, called by 
St. Ignatius the foundation^ because it is, in fact, the 
basis of the whole religious edifice — a maxim which 
has given so many saints to the Church, and which 
constitutes the fundamental principle of all the actions 
of the holy fathers. The maxim is this: "Man was 
created to praise and adore his Lord and his God, and 
in serving him he saves his soul." The old version 
stood as follows: "so that his soul might he saved.^'^ 
But the Holy Father General Eoothan corrected the 
translation, comparing it with the original Spanish — 
the same that was given by the Virgin to St. Ignatius 
at Mauresa — which says, "in order that he may save 
his souV St. Ignatius draws from this principle two 
inferences: ihe^ Jlrst, that every thing in this world 
was created for the use of man, to serve him as the 
means of salvation, and to serve the Lord through 
them ; the second, that man should be indifferent as 
to the choice of the means, inasmuch as the means 
should not be considered according to their real value, 
good or bad, but only in accordance with the end pro- 
posed ; so that if I perceive that by such or such 
means, which, in the opinion of worldly men, would be 
bad, I might, nevertheless, contribute to the glory of 
God and the salvation of my soul, those are the very 
ones I ought to choose. 

Four long discourses were given, treating exclusive- 
ly of this maxim,^ and I assure you that they are not 
too many to uproot all the prejudices of our corrupt 



EXERCISES OF ST. IGNATIUS. 21 

nature, which always wants to judge of good and evil ac- 
cording to a particular view, and not from general views. 

With regard to myself, for example, a great many 
difficulties sprang up in my mind. According to the 
rule, I wrote them down and presented them to the 
Father Director, so that at the proper time Father Z. 
might explain them to me. The following were my 
principal objections : I did not well understand how 
man could save his soul by serving the Lord; for, sal- 
vation being a gift, to serve God would be doing little 
to obtain so great a benefit ; but we should love Him. 
Now, in the maxim of St. Ignatius, there is no mention 
of a gift of grace, or of love. 

The good father came to me, holding in his hand the 
note containing my observations. '' I can very well 
see, "said he, smiling, ''that you are still suffering under 
the influence of Geneva ; there these things are car- 
ried to an extreme; but we, being unbiased, can recon- 
cile the two extremes. Eecall to your mind the theo- 
logical doctrines that you have heard from our Father 
Perrone, in the treatise de Gratia^ and all your difficul- 
ties will vanish. You will recollect that justification, 
which is the ground of our salvation, is a grace, but 
you will remember also that man must prepare him- 
self to receive this grace ; that he must merit it, if 
not de condigno^ at least de congruo. You will re- 
member the anathema pronounced by the Council of 
Trent against Protestants who affirm that man is jus- 
tified by faith without works, ^ and also the teaching of 
the same council,^ that man, to be justified, should pre- 
pare himself; that for this preparation seven things 

^ Council of Trent, Session VI., chap. ix. ^ Id. ibid., chap. vi. 



22 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

are necessary, as follows : Faith, fear, hope, love of 
God, penitence, hatred of sin, and a desire to partici- 
pate in the sacraments. Recollect that justification is 
susceptible of increase, as declared by the same coun- 
cil,^ by sanctification, and by observing the command- 
ments of God and of his Church, and then all difficul- 
ty will disappear. The salvation of the soul is a gift 
of grace,, because the principle of justification is by 
grace^ and that we can not merit it de condigno / yet 
the salvation of the soul depends on us, inasmuch as 
we prepare ourselves for justification, and we increase 
it till we have acquired eternal life. As for love, my 
brother, if St. Ignatius does not mention it, he does not 
for that exclude it. But here, "continued the father, 
"permit me to advise you that the book of Exercises 
was given to St. Ignatius by the Holy Virgin with her 
own hands ; it is, therefore, a revelation equal at least to 
that of the Bible ; one should, therefore, be exceedingly 
circumspect about criticising it. When we know that 
it is a revealed fact (and of this we have evident proof), 
we ought not to discuss, but to submit." 

You can hardly believe the good which these words 
of Father Z. did me. From this moment I applied 
myself incessantly, and with all docility, to study the 
celestial doctrine in the book of the Holy Patriarch. 

The third day the sermons treated of the sins of 
the angels, of that of Adam, and of all men, always 
applying the great maxim of the Foundation^ that sins 
consist in the bad choice of means to attain the end. 
As the lectures on this day and the two following ones 
are intended to terrify the sinner, the windows of the 
3 Council of Trent, Session VI., chap. x. 



EXERCISES OF ST. IGNATIUS. 23 

cliamber are nearly closed so as to interrupt the light, 
so that we could hardly see to move about. This will 
seem to you childish ; but this solitude, this obscuri- 
ty, dismay and terrify one so much that he feels com- 
pelled to make known, as soon as possible, the whole 
state of one's conscience. To all this are added the 
austerities of diet and privation of sleep which are pre- 
scribed for these days. All this produces a state of 
exaltation and fervor which it is nearly impossible to 
resist. 

The fourth day the lectures treat of death and of 
hell. Upon entering my chamber after the morning 
exhortation, full of fervor, I threw myself on my knees 
at the prie-Dieu, and in bending down I gave myself 
so violent a blow on my forehead as nearly to stun 
me. I ran to open my window, but what was my 
horror when I perceived that I had struck my fore- 
head against a skull which the good fathers had 
placed on the prie-Dieu to give me a vivid image of 
what I should one day become! After the second lec- 
ture, instead of a skull I found a picture ; and this 
picture was that of a corpse in a state of dissolution. 
Rats were running from all quarters to devour the 
flesh as it fell in rottenness, detaching itself from the 
bones ; worms and putrefaction covering the corpse, 
above which I read this sentence : " What I am thou 
shalt become ;" and I defy the most obstinate heart 
to resist such shocks. 

The evening after the lecture on Hell you find on 
the prie-Dieu a picture of a soul damned, surrounded 
by flames, demons, and ferocious beasts of all kinds. 

The fifth day the sermon treats of the particular judg- 



24 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

ment and of the universal judgment, and that which 
God will pronounce upon ecclesiastics especially. 

The sixth day an entirely new method commences : 
the windows are more open, the corridors are better 
lighted, the dining-table more amply furnished, and 
the austerities are laid aside. The great '' meditation 
of the two Standards^'' and its consequences occupy this 
day, in which particular application is made of the great 
maxim of the Foundation ; and here is developed the 
mechanism of the exercises. In this meditation St. 
Ignatius transports the Christian, in the first place, to 
the plains of Damascus, where God created man, and 
he shows him Jesus raising the standard of his cross, 
inviting his disciples to follow him in the way of hu- 
mility and penitence ; but few there are who follow 
him. From thence, with a truly inspired flight, he 
passes to the fields of Babylon, and he shows you Sa- 
tan seated on a pulpit of fire and smoke, persuading 
men to follow him in the way of sin ; and many there 
are who follow him. Man must engage with one of 
these two chieftains, and enroll himself under one of 
these two standards. Then he who is following these 
exercises feels himself called upon to decide between 
these two invitations. Oh ! dear Eugene, what a sol- 
emn moment of my life was that which this day wit- 
nessed ! what a day of spiritual elevation ! God re- 
veals himself palpably to each. After this discourse 
you return to your cell ; then all the good fathers go 
from chamber to chamber to keep up the fervor ; they 
present you with a sheet of paper, divided into three 
columns : on the first you are expected to write down 
the reasons which have influenced you in choosing the 



EXERCISES OF ST. IGNATIUS. 25 

profession you have embraced ; on the second, the rea- 
sons you have for being contented with it; on the 
third, those which rendered you discontented with your 
present state ; and in the evening one of the fathers is 
charged to direct you in your choice. I, for example, 
was determined to become a Jesuit, as it appeared to 
me the most straightforward and best means for gain- 
ing the salvation of my soul. But these good fathers 
observed to me that, as a regular Jesuit, I would not 
be able to return to my Protestant country, while, on 
the other hand, the greater glory of God required that 
I should return ; that it was there I could do the most 
for the cause of religion, especially if I preserved in my 
heart the maxims and the friendship of the fathers who 
had directed me, as they had directed many others who 
had become blessed instruments. See, then, how false 
the report is that the Jesuits seek to draw the whole 
world into their company. 

"When these good fathers have obtained these pa- 
pers, written by each at a moment of great religious 
fervor, and after five days of austere practices, then 
they know perfectly the state of the conscience of each 
individual. It is for this reason that these writings 
remain in their hands under the seal of confession. 

After this solemn day the rest of the exercises are 
of little consequence. The seventh day you meditate 
upon the whole life of Jesus Christ ; the eighth, upon 
his passion and death ; the ninth, on his resurrection, 
his ascension, and the descent of the Holy Ghost ; 
finally, on the tenth, there is only one sermon, on the 
love of God. In the morning of the tenth day the 
father-general came to say mass, and addressed to us 

B 



26 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

an exhortation on devotion to the Holy Heart of Mary, 
and on the obligation which rests upon all ecclesiastics 
to promote this devotion as an assured means of sal- 
vation. 

After this we were dismissed by the good fathers, 
whose eyes were filled with tears. 

My dear Eugene, you have just seen with what holy 
skill these good fathers seek the salvation of souls. 
Your Methodists do nothing of the sort. If you should 
come to Rome, and enter this holy retreat, with all 
your goodness of heart, you would leave it a very apos- 
tle. As for me, I can tell you that I feel myself en- 
tirely renewed, and have become quite another man ; 
and, although I have not entirely completed my the- 
ological studies, I have obtained, in spite of this, the 
permission to devote myself to the conversion of Prot- 
estants. I wished to commence by converting some 
of my countrymen who were here, but Providence has 
thrown me into the company of an Anglican minis- 
ter. Only yesterday I began the work of evangeliza- 
tion with him, and I expect great success. In my 
next letter I will tell you how I met him, and the re- 
sult of a discussion already commenced. Adieu, dear 
Eugene. 

Your affectionate Henry. 




CARDINA-L-PRIEST. 



THE ENGLISH PRIEST. 29 



SECOND LETTER. 

My dear Eugene, — I am the happiest man in the 
world. I told you in my last letter that I had become 
acquainted with an English minister. Well, just im- 
agine I have nearly succeeded in converting him ! I 
could never have believed that the conversion of Prot- 
estants was such an easy thing, nor that their argu- 
ments were so very feeble that a little logic and good 
sense sufficed to overthrow them. Poor Eugene ! how 
I pity you ! But I hope that the facts I am going to 
narrate will prove_ a great blessing to you. 

Hardly had I left the house of St. Eusebius, where, 
as I told you in my last, I performed my spiritual ex- 
ercises, when I went to the Church of St. Peter to ob- 
tain a plenary indulgence. After having accomplished 
my acts of devotion, I stopped a moment to contemplate 
the superb mausoleum of the Pope Eezzonico, a work 
of the immortal Canova. I am no artist, but the sight 
of such a monument fills one with enthusiasm for the 
fine arts. This statue of the Pope, in marble white as 
snow, represents him kneeling, his hands clasped in 
the attitude of prayer, with an expression so faithful 
that you feel disposed to hold your breath for fear of 
troubling his devotions. The artist has seized the 
inspired moment of the fervent prayer that this Pope 
addresses to God when he beseeches him to remove 
him from this world ere he shall be obliged to suppress 



30 EOME, CHRISTIAN AISTD PAPAL. 

the Company of Jesus, the most powerful support of 
the Church. Two lions, the finest ever executed by 
the chisel, present a striking contrast to the evangelic 
mildness expressed by the countenance of the Pope, 
the principal figure of the monument ; they enchant 
and ravish you. 

While I stood in ecstasy before this mausoleum, I 
heard near me a slight movement. I turned, and saw 
a man about thirty years of age, with a pleasant face, 
dressed in black, with a long coat reaching below his 
knees, and fastened down in front with a long row of 
buttons, allowing a small portion of a white cravat to 
be seen. This man was also occupied in contempla- 
ting this marvel of modern art. 

At first I took him to be a priest, but, seeing that 
he held in his hand a round hat, I perceived my mis- 
take. He approached, and, saluting me courteously, 
commenced speaking of the beauty of the mausoleum, 
desired to know the name of the sculptor, and asked 
me some question about the acts of the Pope honored 
by such a magnificent monument. " This Pope, "said 
he, "must have rendered great services to religion to 
have merited this immortal memorial." I replied that 
Clement had indeed been a very holy Pope, and a great 
protector of the Jesuits ; and, after stopping a few mo- 
ments longer, we left the church together. 

I did not know who the man was, but from his 
looks I judged him to be an Englishman ; from his 
dress I took him for a priest or a monk, who in En- 
gland are obliged to dress like laymen in a modest 
black suit. I was on the point of addressing a ques- 
tion to him, when he said to me. 



THE ENGLISH PEIEST. 31 

" Truly tliis is a magnificent temple, and worthy of 
the majesty of God. In England we have no idea of 
such a temple." 

"Pardon me," said I; "may I ask if you are a 
Protestant or Catholic ?" 

"I am a Catholic," he replied, "but not a Roman 
Catholic. I am a minister of the Anglican Church, 
which is the Catholic and Apostolic Church, because 
it retains the doctrine of venerable antiquity, and pos- 
sesses the apostolic succession." 

I perceived, then, that I had to do with a Protestant 
priest, and I rendered thanks to God in my heart that 
he offered me so early an opportunity to put my zeal 
to the proof. Nevertheless, I shall not hide from you 
that I was somewhat embarrassed, not knowing how 
to commence the conversation. We walked along for 
some moments in silence, when I asked him, by way 
of commencing the conversation, what he thought of 
the separation of the Church of England from that of 
Rome. Then, with a deep sigh, he replied : 

" Oh ! that event has been the greatest of misfor- 
tunes for the poor Church of England. The separa- 
tion was a necessity without doubt, because matters 
were treated on both sides with so much warmth, but 
it was a most disastrous necessity: the Church of 
England has lost much by this separation." 

At this moment we reached his lodgings, when he 
shook me by the hand and said, 

"I like very much the priests of the Roman Church, 
and I should be much pleased to see you again, and 
to converse with you about religion." 

After that we took leave of each other. You may 



32 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

• 

imagine my astonishment at this conversation. A 
Protestant, a real Protestant minister, who speaks with 
so much veneration, or, rather, with so much love of 
the Catholic Church ! This appeared to me an inex- 
plicable phenomenon. The evening of the same day 
I went to the Roman College to see my master and 
get his advice. I related what had happened, and, aft- 
er having reflected a little, he told me : 

"Your English priest seems to me a Puseyite.^'^ 

Then I begged the good father to give me an exact 
notion of Puseyism^ which I had often heard spoken 
of, but which I had never clearly comprehended. 

" It would be rather a long affair," replied the good 
father, "to relate the history of the religious move- 
ment of Oxford, called Puseyism^ from Dr. Pusey, who 
stands at its head. If you only knew the trouble we 
have had, and still continue to give ourselves, in order 
to sustain, excite, and preserve this movement, which 
produces such great results in England I But the his- 
tory of Puseyism will interest you but little, at least 
at present. It is well, however, that you should know 
how to conduct yourself with this Anglican minister 
in your discussions. 

*' Ascertain, in the first place, whether you have 
truly to do with a Puseyite, of which, from the con- 
versation you have had with him to-day, I have little 
doubt ; but you must be still more positive that such 
is the case. To learn this, you must begin by speak- 
ing of the Church and its ministers ; but confine your- 
self to the bishops, priests, and deacons ; you may say, 
with courtesy, that the true Church is that where the 
apostolic succession is to be found. If he be a Pusey- 



DISCUSSION. 



33 



ite, lie -will agree to this doctrine without the least hesi- 
tation. Then, better to assure yourself, you may speak 
of episcopacy as an office of divine institution in the 
Church, and may touch with delicacy on the superi- 
ority of bishops over priests by divine right ; you may 
speak of the power of the clergy in the absolution of 
sins, transmitted by Jesus Christ to the ministers of 
his Church — a power preserved by the apostolic suc- 
cession. Then introduce with prudence the subject 
of auricular confession as a practice which dates as 
far back as the first centuries of the Church. Tell 
him that our Father Marchi has discovered confes- 
sionals in the Catacombs, and you will see that this 
discovery will interest him vastly. 




CHAPEL IN THE CATACOMBS. 



" My son, you must not attack Puseyites with the 
Bible like other Protestants ; they admit the authority 
of the Bible, but they recognize that of tradition also, 
the interpretation of the fathers, and, above all, ecclesi- 

B 2 



34 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

astical antiquities. They repudiate the Protestant 
principle of free inquiry^ and the absolute and ex- 
clusive authority of the Bible, in which you perceive 
they are very similar to ourselves. Be careful never to 
place yourself with him on the footing of discussion, 
but see first whether he will agree to these points. 
If your minister accepts them, he is a Puseyite^ and 
then, my friend, I would advise you never to enter 
upon a discussion with him." 

'^ Excuse me, my father," said I ; " but if the Pu- 
seyites admit all these things, why are they not Cath- 
olics?" 

" Yes, they admit these, and many other things be- 
sides," replied the father. " They admit the adora- 
tion of the Eucharist, the worship of the cross and im- 
ages, with some restrictions, it is true, but still they 
admit them, together with prayers for the dead, and 
Purgatory, besides the doctrine of justification nearly 
as held by the Council of Trent. They bestow high 
praise upon monastic vows and the celibacy of the 
priests, and desire the establishment of convents ; they 
make use of medals, crucifixes, tapers, and approve in 
general of all the usages of the Catholic Church which 
are capable of being justified by their antiquity, and 
they desire to become reunited to the mother church, 
which their fathers so imprudently abandoned. And 
note well that the Puseyites are not like the obstinate 
Methodists, who fasten themselves to the Bible, and 
are unwilling to grant any thing that is not found 
there. The Puseyites are much more reasonable: 
they concede the authority of the Church, and every 
thing that is justifiable in Christian an-tiquity." 



X DISCUSSION. 35 

" Why, then, my father, do we not seek to make 
them Catholics ? It appears to me that, with such 
principles, their conversion would not be difficult." 

^' Nothing is more truly easy, my son, than the con- 
version of a Puseyite ; if he is really consistent he 
must become a Catholic. Admit, for example, that 
the only true Church is that in which the apostolic suc- 
cession of its ministers is found transmitted by the 
imposition of the hands of the bishops, and what is the 
consequence? That the Roman Church is the true 
one, for it possesses this succession. By granting that 
the rule of faith is not in the Bible alone, but is also 
found in tradition and in the authority of the Church, 
there results the necessary consequence that all the 
Protestant churches, including the Episcopal Church 
of England, recognizing the Bible as the only rule of 
faith, are false, and that the Roman Church is the only 
true Church, because her rule of faith is based upon 
the Bible, tradition, and the authority of the Church 
itself. You see clearly, therefore, my friend, that a 
little logic is sufficient to render all Puseyites Catho- 
lics." 

''But do you not believe that, if all the Puseyites 
should become converted to Catholicism, it would be 
for the greater glory of God ?" 

"No, my son ; you must permit the Puseyite move- 
ment to continue, so that it may bear its own fruits. 
If all the Puseyites should become Catholics, this ag- 
itation would cease, the Protestants Avould be alarmed, 
and all that the Roman Church would have gained 
would be a few thousand individuals, and nothing 
more! It is well enough, from time to time, that a 



36 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

Puseyite doctor should become a Catholic, so that, 
under our direction, he may more properly continue 
the movement ; but it would not be advantageous if a 
great number came over to us. Puseyism is a living 
witness in the midst of our enemies of the necessity 
of Catholicism. It is a worm which, properly nour- 
ished and cared for, will gnaw at the vitals of Protest- 
antism, and destroy it in the end. England must ex- 
piate the great sin of her separation from Rome. She 
shall pay for it, be sure of that, and shortly too. ..." 

" But, my father, in the mean time, ou^ good friends 
the Puseyites who die are damned, since they die out 
of the Holy Church." 

" Our good fathers who are in England provide for 
this contingency: they are invested for this purpose 
by the Holy Father with the necessary powers to re- 
ceive the abjurations of the dying whenever it is pru- 
dent to do so ; but if they could not, why, their dam- 
nation could not be imputed to us. The end, my son, 
justifies the means. Our aim is a most holy one, 
namely, the conversion of England, and the best means 
to attain it is }yjPuseyism. You, who have recently 
practiced the holy exercises, must recollect that all 
means are good if they only lead to the end. Pru- 
dence, the first of the cardinal virtues, teaches us some- 
times to permit a little evil in order that a great good 
may result. Just as an invalid permits the amputa- 
tion of a limb to save his body, so we also may be 
obliged to permit the damnation of a few hundred Pu- 
seyites that England some day may be converted. So, 
my son, do not give yourself much trouble about con- 
verting this man ; bring him to us ; Father Marchi will 



ATTEMPT AT CONVERSION. 37 

conduct him to the Catacombs, and will show him sev- 
eral monuments of Christian antiquity that will con- 
firm him all the more in his opinions, and he will he 
able to do more for us in England as a Puseyite than 
as a declared CathoHc. ..." 

I admit, dear Eugene, that I was not fully convinced 
by this reasoning of my professor, and I resolved to 
myself to make use of his advice only so far as it 
should lead to the conversion of my Englishman. 

This being decided upon, the next morning I went 
to find him. He received me with the greatest amia- 
bility, and we resumed our conversation on religion. 
I will not relate in detail this conversation, which treat- 
ed of the divers subjects indicated by my professor, 
and upon which he agreed with me almost entirely ; 
but I did not stop there. He agreed with me that the 
only veritable Church of Jesus Christ was that visible 
society established on the day of Pentecost, whose 
founders were the apostles, whose heads were their suc- 
cessors, and whose members comprised all those who 
professed Christianity. I drew the inference that the 
veritable Church being a visible society^ a visible body 
should also have a visible head ; that the heads of the 
Church being the successors of the apostles — that is 
to say, the bishops, there should also exist among them 
an order, and, consequently, a head of the bishops, who 
was also the head of all the Church ; and it is upon 
this bishop that the succession of St. Peter must have 
devolved. 

Mr. Manson (such is the name of the Englishman) 
perceived at once the results of my reasoning.^ He 

^ Newman's Sermon on the Church. 



38 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

saw that he could not elude them, for they followed 
from his own principles, and that one can not remain 
a Puseyite, at least logically, without recognizing the 
primacy of the Pope, and all the prerogatives which 
grew out of it, as well as their consequences. Then 
he began to defend himself, saying that the Roman 
Church had degenerated in many points from the beau- 
tiful Catholic doctrine of antiquity. I observed to him 
that, granting this — which, however, I did not — my 
conclusions were not invalidated, for if it be once estab- 
lished that the only veritable Church of Jesus Christ 
is that in which the apostolic succession is found, and 
the fact of the existence of this succession in the Roman 
Church not being doubted, it resulted that this Church 
was the only true one ; and, as there is no hope of 
salvation out of the true Church of Christ, one must 
absolutely belong to the Roman Catholic Church, or 
else go to hell. 

Nevertheless, I w^ould not admit that the Roman 
Church had degenerated from the doctrine of antiqui- 
ty ; and I repeated all the more willingly the word 
antiquity^ for, to tell you the truth, my dear Eugene, 
controversies with Protestants are difficult for us when 
they must be resolved by the Bible. Tou Protestants, 
admitting neither the authority of tradition nor the in- 
terpretation of the infallible Church, do not stand on 
the same ground with us ; but when the controversy 
is based not exclusively on the Bible, when tradition 
and the authority of the Church are added, when you 
see the proof of doctrines in antiquity, then the advan- 
tage is on our side. Accordingly, I asked Mr. Manson 
what those doctrines were in which, according to him, 



HOPES OF VICTORY. 39 

the Roman Catholic Church had degenerated from ven- 
erable antiquity. 

Here he appeared to be a little embarrassed, and 
from a multitude of words I understood him to allude 
to the service in the Latin tongue and the communion 
in one kind only. This, said he, was contrary to an- 
tiquity. Then I endeavored to demonstrate to him, 
firom his own principles, that these things were imma- 
terial as to the truth of the Roman Catholic Church, 
since they in no wise belonged to the field of dogma, 
but only to that of discipline ; and that when once we 
regard the Church — that is, the bishops assembled in 
council — as the supreme authority over the whole 
Church, we must grant that they have the right to 
establish this discipline, which in a word means that 
to reject discipline one must deny the authority of the 
Church. On the whole, I thought that I should surely 
gain the victory, and Mr. Manson appeared already to 
experience a presentiment of his defeat, when his ser- 
vant announced two visitors. 

Mr. Manson rose to receive two gentlemen who en- 
tered ; one was a young Englishman, and the other a 
man about thirty years of age, whom I recognized by 
his accent to be an Italian. Then, to my great regret, 
I took leave of Mr. Manson, who asked me for my ad- 
dress, and assured me that, if he had known it, he would 
have called on me before to continue the conversation, 
which interested him exceedingly ; thereupon we sep- 
arated. 

I only await, my dear Eugene, the hour and the mo- 
ment to bring this matter to a termination. The con- 
version of the man is certain. After I have seen him 



40 



ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 



and made further progress in the discussion, I shall 
write to you immediately. Adieu. 




SYMBOLICAL LAMP FROM THE CATACOMBS. 




CARDINAL IN FULL COSTUME. 



DISAPPEOBATION OF FATHER P. 43 



THJRD LETTER. 

The popular proverb which says, Man proposes 
and God disposes, is but too true. I had proposed to 
convert the Englishman to Catholicism, which I spoke 
to you about in my last, and God has chosen, perhaps, 
to make me the instrument of two other conversions ; 
only it is painful to think that this event should have 
resulted in a break — I should almost say an open rup- 
ture — between my master and myself; and I fear lest 
it may have estranged the good Father Jesuit from 
me* But God will take care of this, for I act only for 
his glory. 

I related to you in my last how I left Mr. Manson 
upon the arrival of two strangers. It was then noon. 
Two hours later I received a note from my master, 
the Father P., who invited me to visit him at the Ro- 
man College the same evening. I went there at the 
appointed hour. 

Father P. received me at first with coldness, but 
soon after, assuming his ordinary paternal tone, he 
said to me, 

" It appears, my son, that you have not in the least 
profited by the exercises of St. Ignatius !" 

Mortified by this reproach, I begged him to explain. 

"What have you done this morning?" 

Then I related to him with simplicity all my con- 
versation with Mr. Manson. But he, interrupting me, 
said, 



44 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

" I know all that, and it is for tliis reason that I 
have sent for you. You have not chosen to follow my 
counsel, hut have entered on a discussion in spite of 
my advice, and you have compromised every thing." 

I could not understand how the victory, all but cer- 
tain, which I had gained, could have produced so much 
injury, and I asked humbly for further explanation. 

" My son," replied the good father, " if you had fol- 
lowed the directions which I gave you, you would not 
have made so long a visit. These two gentlemen, 
coming after your departure, would' not have found 
you still there, or, if they had met you, would not have 
found you in the midst of a discussion. This visit 
would have passed as a simple visit of politeness, and 
all would have ended well. But do you know what 
happened after your departure? These two gentle- 
men wished to know what this Abbe had been saying 
so earnestly. Mr. Manson told them ; then they also 
took it in their heads to join in the discussion." 

''Oh, my father!" exclaimed I, interrupting him, 
" let them do their best ; if the truth be on my side, 
what have I to fear ?" 

"Tou do not know," said he, ''with whom you 
have to deal. These two men are not Puseyites^ but 
obstinate Protestants, who will attack you with the 
Bible, and you will not know how to reply to them. 
The Holy Church does not permit even inquisitors to 
dispute with heretics on the Bible. No, my son ; if 
you have committed one fault, do not commit a second 
one ; withdraw from this discussion ; give as a pretext 
a want of time ; say that you have some business to 
attend to, and that you can not occupy yourself with 



OBEDIlCNCE* 45 

any thing else ; only endeavor to bring the Englishman 
to me, and do not meddle any farther in this affair." 

After this I left the good father, folly resolved to 
obey him, though with great reluctance. I was really 
surprised to see him so well informed as to all that oc- 
curred, but, dismissing all suspicion, I went home, de- 
termined never to return to Mr. Manson, and politely 
to excuse myself if he should send for me. But here 
I repeat my proverb, Man proposes and God disposes ; 
for, as you will see, I could not keep my resolution. 

The day after this conversation, at about eleven 
o'clock in the morning, as I was walking home after 
my lessons, I met Mr. Manson, who was seeking me 
anxiously. 

" Dear friend," said he," I have need of you." 

I conducted him to my house. Then he informed 
me that the two gentlemen who had interrupted our 
conversation were exceedingly desirous to have it re- 
sumed. He told me that the younger one, Mr. Sweet- 
man, was a very rich young gentleman, who had 
studied in Oxford, and was much pleased with the 
new doctrines ; that his father had sent him to Rome, 
believing that a sight of the Roman court would con- 
vince him of his error, and would bring him back to 
Protestantism. For this purpose he gave him as a 
companion Mr. Pasquali, the other gentleman. This 
Mr. Pasquali is a Piedmontese, of the sect of the Wal- 
denses, and, as he knows Rome very well, he has un- 
dertaken to show Mr. Sweetman all the corruption of 
Catholicism. 

''You see, therefore, that this Mr. Pasquali is our 
common adversary. I am not a Roman Catholic, but 



46 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

I can not suffer evil to be spoken of the Catholic com- 
munion, which is incontestably the most ancient of all 
Christian communions." 

Eesolved to follow in all points the advice of my 
master, I excused myself Tby telling him that I abso- 
lutely could not enter upon a new discussion from a 
want of time. Mr. Manson appeared satisfied with 
my excuse, and said no more about it. He remained 
a few moments longer, and upon departing said, 

" I hope, at least, that you will not refuse me an 
hour of your time, but will come this evening and 
take a cup of tea with me, for you have no lessons at 
night." 

It appeared to me that it would be impolite to re- 
fuse, so I accepted. 

At the hour agreed upon I called at Mr. Manson's, 
but Mr. Sweetman and the Waldensian were already 
there. The former introduced me to those two gen- 
tlemen in accordance with English etiquette. We 
commenced conversing on different subjects, but soon 
Mr. Manson began to speak of the beautiful churches 
of Rome, and of the astonishing monuments of antiq- 
uity to be found there, and he concluded by saying 
that if the fanatical dissenters who declaim so loudly 
against the Roman Church could only see Rome, ex- 
amine its monuments, temples, hierarchy, and the maj- 
esty of its ceremonies, certainly they would not con- 
tinue to be so much opposed to it. 

" My views are the very reverse of yours," said the 
Waldensian hereupon," and I am persuaded that a sin- 
cere Protestant, in good faith, who comes to Rome, will 
find precisely, in her monuments, temples, hierarchy, 



THE AVALDENSIAN. 47 

and ceremonies, reasons for her condemnation, and for 
declaring her fallen from the ancient faith preached by 
St. Paul. I will go still farther, and sustain that ev- 
ery sincere and enlightened Catholic who will examine 
these things, and act consistently, must abandon that 
Church." 

Many other things were said on the same subject. 
Mr. Manson supported his statement with warmth, 
and the Waldensian, cold as ice, did not give up an 
inch, while Mr. Sweetman endeavored to occupy mid- 
dle ground. For my part, I kept silence, not wishing 
to disobey my master, who had interdicted all discus- 
sion with these gentlemen. However, I thought with- 
m myself that I could very well take part in the de- 
bate without disobeying, because it did not relate to 
the Bible. Nevertheless, I remained silent, when Mr. 
Sweetman, addressing me directly, said, 

''Mr. Abbe, you ought not to remain quiet while a 
subject in which you are so much interested is dis- 
cussed." 

"The Abbe is silent," said the Waldensian, ''be- 
cause he knows that the truth is on our side." 

At these words I felt myself reddening, and an im- 
pulse of holy zeal incited me to attack this infamous 
heretic, and teach him to speak more respectfully of 
the holy Catholic religion. I forgot the advice of my 
professor, and, with voice choking with indignation, I 
replied that my silence was caused by my pity for the 
absurdity of his reasons, which appeared to me unwor- 
thy of any reply. 

"How dare you," added I, "after seeing these monu- 
ments, which attest the venerable antiquity of Cathol- 



48 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

icism, conclude that it is false? Perhaps, for a religion 
to be the veritable one, it must be modern." 

The Waldensian then held out his hand in token of 
friendship, and said, while shaking mine, 

"This confirms me in my good opinion of you. 
You are a sincere Catholic; you are a Catholic be- 
cause you think that it is right to be one; and if you 
should perceive that you were in error, you would aban- 
don your views, I am sure, and turn to the Gospel." 

You can imagine, dear Eugene, how shocked I was 
at such a proposition. I abandon the Catholic relig- 
ion! I would prefer death rather than entertain the 
least doubt of its truth ! Then the exhortations of 
my master returned to my mind, and I felt how cor- 
rect they were. I repented of my disobedience, and 
determined never more to have any thing to do with 
heretics of this sort. I awaited anxiously the oppor- 
tunity to leave this house, never to return to it. I 
merely replied that Mr. Pasquali was a thousand 
leagues from expressing my true thoughts. 

"Very well," rejoined the Waldensian ; "let us prove 
it. I propose to challenge you, not by words, but by 
facts. You may conduct us in our visit to those mon- 
uments, which you think prove the truth of Catholicism ; 
we will examine them together, and I give you my word 
of honor that, if you succeed in convincing me of the 
truth of Catholicism, I will immediately become a Cath- 
olic; whereas, if I succeed in persuading you, you may 
remain free to do as your conscience dictates. If you 
do not accept a challenge on such equitable terms, then 
you must permit me to believe that you acknowledge 
yourself vanquished." 



DISPLEASUEE OF THE PROFESSOR. 49 

I sought still to excuse myself from a "want of time, 
but the Waldensian observed that, as it was a question 
of converting to the truth three men whom I believed 
to be in error, I ought to sacrifice every other occupa- 
tion to a work of such importance. He observed, be- 
sides, that this excuse was unseasonable, since, having 
commenced the discussion with Mr. Manson, I could 
not conscientiously give it up. 

"Besides," said he again, "we are in no hurry. 
You have no lessons on Thursday, and you will soon 
have two weeks' vacation at the Christmas holidays. 
You can, then, give us Thursday and your vacation." 

Having no other excuse, I accepted the challenge, 
and it was agreed that we should begin our excursions 
on Thursday. This occurred on Tuesday evening. 

Wednesday I went to the College. Upon entering, 
I perceived the professor eyed me askance. Can it 
be possible, thought I, that he knows already what 
happened last night ? Who could have informed 
him ? After the lesson, I begged the professor to al- 
low me a few moments' conversation. As soon as we 
were alone, he gave me a severe reproof for my diso- 
bedience. 

"Be carefiil," said he; "I will not protect you 
against the terrible consequences this may have for 
you." 

I was amazed by the reproaches of the good father, 
and burst into tears. As he appeared about to retire 
and leave me there, I threw myself at his feet, clasp- 
ing his knees, and besought him so earnestly that at 
last he seemed to be moved, and, resuming his friendly 
tone of voice, 

C 



50 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

"Well," said he, "let us endeavor to remedy, in 
some measure, your imprudence; but I assure you that 
this is the last time that I will counsel you, and if you 
do not obey me to the letter, I will abandon you to all 
the consequences of your folly." 

I promised blind obedience. Then the good father 
led me to his chamber to give me proper instructions. 

I relate all this, my dear Eugene, that you may 
know the prudence of the good fathers, who, fearing 
my youth and inexperience, gave me useful advice to 
withdraw honorably from this dispute wherein they 
saw me so inconsiderately engaged. 

Having entered his chamber, 

"My son," said he, "since you have become en- 
gaged in this terrible affair, you must withdraw from 
it with honor. Go, therefore, to-morrow to the meet- 
ing, but only to-morrow ! You must make a choice 
of some point of primary importance, which shall be 
easy to defend, and in which you may succeed hand- 
somely. Let the theme, therefore, of your research for 
to-morrow be Saint Peter. Conduct these gentlemen 
directly to the Church of Saint Peter in vinculis^ and 
there the Father Abbot, informed beforehand by me, 
will show you the monuments which attest that this 
church was built by the Senator Pudens, and conse- 
crated by Saint Peter himself. He will show you, 
also, the chains wherewith the impious Nero fettered 
that apostle. From thence proceed to the Roman 
Forum, called the Camjpo Yaccino^ and conduct them 
to the Mamertine prison, where Peter was incarcerated. 
Then go up to Saint Peter Montorio^ and show them 
the place where he was crucified. From thence lead 



THE professor's COUNSEL. 51 

them to Santa Maria delta Traspontina^ and in the 
fourth chapel on the left hand point out the two col- 
umns to which the holy apostles Peter and Paul were 
bound and scourged. Finally, conduct them to the 
Vatican, to see the bodies of the holy apostles, and to 
the Cathedral of Saint Peter. From all these monu- 
ments you will deduce that Saint Peter was really Bish- 
op of Rome, and, consequently, that all the promises 
made to Peter by Jesus Christ, namely, the keys of the 
kingdom of heaven, primacy, and infallibility (Luke, 
xxii., 32) passed to his successors; which succession 
has been preserved down to the actual sovereign pon- 
tiff, Pius IX. Here the Waldensian will try to equivo- 
cate ; he will want to argue from the Bible with refer- 
ence to the primacy of the Pope. Then you will call 
him to order, the challenge only referring to the mon- 
uments ; besides, you may be sure the good Puseyite 
will come to your aid." 

"But do you believe, my father, that Mr. Pasquali 
will give up so easily ?" 

'*No matter, my son, about his yielding; it takes 
more than that to overcome the obstinacy of a Wal- 
densian. The only question is that you may withdraw 
from all this honorably. Then you must appear of- 
fended, and must reproach him for not having followed 
your argument ; you must feign impatience, and re- 
tire; in this manner you can get out of the affair." 

I know that all that these good fathers say is for 
the greatest glory of God ; but I will confess to you 
with sincerity, my dear Eugene, that I was little dis- 
posed to follow their counsel ; it appeared to me to be 
cowardice thus to abandon the Held of battle. 



52 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

The father perceived my trouble, and, tapping me 
lightly on the shoulder, said, 

"Poor Henry ! you are really unlucky in this first 
trial of your missionary life ; you commence with a 
Puseyite, whom you ought not to convert, and with an 
obstinate and knowing Waldensian, with whom you 
should not risk yourself. But do not be dis- 
couraged ; another time you will have better luck." 

" But could I not—" 

" No," retorted the father, sharply, interrupting me ; 
" you can not, you ought not to do differently from 
what I have told you to do. Do you know what will 
happen if you do not obey ? You will be embarrass- 
ed by questions from which you can not extricate your- 
self. From the antiquities, he will pass to the Bible, 
and make use of it with the pernicious art that these 
heretics possess ; the result will be that the Puseyite 
will abandon us and return to Protestantism, that Mr. 
Sweetman will bury himself deeper in his errors, and 
that you will have made the victory easy to the tri- 
umphant Waldensian ! And you, what will become of 
you ? Recollect that at Rome there is an Inquisition 
not only for heretics, but also for every one who does 
the least damage to the holy Church." 

This said, he opened the door and bade me farewell. 

At this conversation I was beside myself; the last 
words of my professor terrified me. 

Leaving the College, therefore, I returned home, 
where I found a note from the secretary of the deputy 
cardinal, who ordered me to appear immediately at the 
Chancery to receive orders from his eminence concern- 
ing me. 



CITED BEFOEE THE DEPUTY CARDINAL. 53 

When an ecclesiastic is cited at the Chancery in this 
manner, it is a proof that he has been accused of some 
wrong action. 

I hastened thither, therefore, and found there a few 
priests, who measured me from head to foot with a sar- 
donic smile. One of them, a man of gigantic size, told 
me I must speak with the canon secretary, and I was 
immediately ushered into his room. The secretary to 
whom I refer is a priest seventy or eighty years of 
age. This venerable man, who is the model and mir- 
ror of all the priests of Rome, cherished by the Pope, 
beloved by all the cardinals, respected, I may almost 
say adored, by the w^hole clergy, a zealous preacher, 
an indefatigable confessor, appears always the same, 
from the morning, when he rises to say mass, till the 
evening, which he ends invariably with a game of 
cards. Having been announced and introduced, the 
good canon made me sit down by his side ; then he 
said he was grieved at being obliged to reprimand me, 
but that his office obliged him to do so ; then, after 
many words, he gave me to understand that the depu- 
ty cardinal was rather uneasy about me, because on 
the preceding evening I had had a conversation with 
three Protestants whom he forbade me again visiting. 
"You are acquainted," he added, "with the canons 
of the third and fourth of the holy councils of Lateran, 
which forbid even to salute heretics ; and you, my 
son, you — you have taken tea with them ! ! An ec- 
clesiastic ! What does this mean ?" 

As for me, at that moment I knew no longer to 
which world I belonged. Accused, blamed, menaced 
from all sides for an action that appeared to me the 



54 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

best I had ever performed, I could no longer resist the 
violence of my grief; a convulsive fit of tears suffo- 
cated me. The canon called for aid, and the chamber 
was soon filled with priests. Having recovered my 
senses, I begged the good priest to listen to me, every 
one present retiring. I related to him all that had 
passed. When I had finished, he said, 

'' Reassure yourself, my son : the vice-cardinal was 
dificrently informed ; but I have confidence in what 
you tell me, and, although I have not the power to 
change the order of the cardinal, yet I will assume the 
responsibility ; his eminence is a reasonable man, and 
I will easily persuade him. Continue, therefore, my 
son, your work, but do it prudently ; I tell you this 
from charity, for, personally, you can not, in any event, 
compromise the cause of the Church, because you have 
no official character. Only be careful of yourself, my 
son, and, before commencing any discussion with these 
heretics, recite three times an Ave Maria to the holy 
Virgin, who, as the Church teaches, has alone con- 
founded all heresies ; then fear nothing." - 

Thus spoke this worthy priest. 

As for me, having become more quiet, I resolved to 
follow his advice rather than that of my master, and I 
returned home better satisfied. To-morrow our first 
visit to the Roman antiquities will take place, and the 
day after I will write you the result. 

With the best love of your affectionate friend, 

Henry. 



VISIT TO THE MONUMENTS. 55 



FOURTH LETTER. 

Rome, January, 1847. 

My dear Eugene, — ^You touched me to the quick 
in your last by telling me that, if I had not kept my 
word by informing you of the result of my discussion 
with the Waldensian, it was doubtless because he 
had reduced me to silence ; but you wounded me still 
more by the suspicion you express in predicting that 
the discussion will end in what you call my conversion 
to Protestantism. No, dear Eugene, before harboring 
for one instant the thought of abandoning my holy 
religion, I pray God to hasten my death. 

If I have remained a whole month without writing 
to you, it is because I was waiting to be able to re- 
late in a few words the issue of the debate with the 
Waldensian. But since you press me so hard, I am 
determined to write you how things stand, and I do 
it with complete frankness, confiding in your friend- 
ship, convinced that you will not use my letters to 
compromise me, and persuaded, on the other hand, 
that I shall be able definitively to announce to you my 
victory over the Waldensian. I will relate, therefore, 
with all sincerity, what occurred during our visit to 
the monuments. 

On the day agreed upon, we went, in the first place, 
to the church of Saint Peter in vinculis^ situated on 
the southern point of the Esquiline Hill. A superb 
portico of fine arcades forms the entrance to this mag- 
nificent church, whose architecture is both cheerful and 



56 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

majestic. I shall not describe to you the beautiful 
picture of Saint Augustine, by Guercino, nor that rep- 
resenting the deliverance of Saint Peter from prison, 
by Domenichino ; but the chef d'oeuvre of Michael An- 
gelo, the statue of Moses, destined for the mausoleum 
of Julius II. (which was never built), eclipses every 
thing else in this church. Messrs. Manson, Sweet- 
man, and I stood in admiration before this statue, 
which shows how high the inspiration of art can at- 
tain. During this, the Waldensian smiled at our en- 
thusiasm ; then, touching me gently on the shoulder, 
he said, 

" Sir Abbe, I beg you to explain this contradiction. 
Tour Church says that churches are holy places con- 
secrated to the Lord, and it applies to the material 
part of them all that is written concerning the Temple 
of Jerusalem. How is it, then, that your temples are 
transformed into exhibitions of the fine arts, and mu- 
seums, and are thereby exposed to profanation ?" 

I replied that these statues were placed in the 
churches to excite the devotion of the people. 

"A very commonplace remark," interrupted the 
Waldensian; "but let us not enter so soon upon the 
question of images. I maintain that, even should I 
agree to what you say, this monument is surely not 
placed here to incite to devotion." 

" Magnificence," I replied, " is well suited to the 
house of God." 

"Yes," he rejoined; "but it is written that it is 
holiness that becometh the house of the Lord." 

After this we passed into the sacristy, where the 
Father Abbot was waiting for us ; he received us with 



THE CHAINS OF SAINT PETER. 57 

ceremonious politeness. Here stands a beautiful mar- 
ble altar, upon which is placed a small but finely 
sculptured shrine, also in marble. The Father Abbot 
had four tapers lighted, and, after putting on his sur- 
plice and stole, he opened the shrine and took out a 
beautiful urn of rock crystal, containing the chains of 
Saint Peter. Then he related how, in the fifth cen- 
tury, Jxivenal^ patriarch of Jerusalem, had sent as a 
present to Pope Leo I. the chain with which St. Paul 
had been bound in Jerusalem by the order of Herod ; 
he added that this chain having been placed by the 
side of the one with which Saint Peter was bound in 
Rome by the order of Nero, the two chains spon- 
taneously united themselves, and ever after formed but 
one chain ; thereupon that the Empress Eudoxia, wife 
of Valentinian III., constructed this church on the site 
of the ancient temple built by Pudens, and consecra- 
ted it to Saint Peter. 

"Is this account well authenticated?" asked the 
Waldensian. 

" To presume to doubt it," replied the abbot, *'you 
must doubt the clearest evidence. If you will take the 
trouble to come up to my apartment, I will show you 
the documents." 

We went up, therefore, into the chamber of the ab- 
bot, who took from his library the first volume of the 
works of the learned Tillemont, and read from page 
172 as follows: "Tradition says that Peter convert- 
ed, while in Eome, the Senator Pudens ; that he lived 
in his house, and consecrated it, so that it became the 
first church in Rome, under the name of Saint Peter 
in viiiculisJ''* 

C 2 



68 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

At this I was delighted, and I admired the wisdom 
of my master for having so well planned and directed 
my visit to the monuments. Mr. Manson exclaimed, 

"Ah! truly Rome is the only place where one can 
gain a thorough knowledge of holy antiquities." 

The Waldensian, with his accustomed coolness, re- 
joined, 

"But do you believe. Father Abbot, that Tillemont 
really placed confidence in such a fact ?" 

"What a question!" replied the abbot; "Tille- 
mont based his statements on tradition.", 

"Very well," proceeded the Waldensian; "let me 
look, if you please, at the second volume of Tille- 
mont." 

And, having received it, he opened at page 616, and 
showed that Tillemont founded his assertion on the 
apocryphal book of the Pastor^ attributed to Hermas ; 
then he demonstrated that all the events related by 
Hermas took place in the time of Antoninus, that is, 
about the middle of the second century, from which, if 
we were to rely upon this tradition, we must conclude 
that Saint Peter lived in the house of Pudens in the 
year 150 after Christ ! 

The Father Abbot and I were overwhelmed with 
dismay at this observation ; nevertheless, the good fa- 
ther did not lose courage, and drew from a bureau an 
old Martyrology, bound in parchment, with illumina- 
ted capitals, and opening it at the date of the 1st of 
August, he read these words in Latin : " Consecration 
by Saint Peter, the apostle,, of the first church built 
in Rome." 

The Waldensian took the Martyrology to examine 



SAINT PETER IN ^NCULIS. 59 

it, and perceived from the writing and the illumina- 
tions that it was a work of the fourteenth century. 

*'But," said he, " a document posterior by fourteen 
centuries to the fact to be proven is a testimony whol- 
ly useless, Mr. Abbot." 

''Very well ; here is another of the Cardinal Bona," 
rejoined the abbot, producing a book of the Liturgies 
of the said cardinal, "which contains the history of 
this church written by one of our canons." 

"All these testimonies, my reverend father," said 
the Waldensian, " are modern ; but let us not depart 
from Tillemont, if you please. Look at what is writ- 
ten in page 504 ; read it — read it, Sir Abbot. We can 
not believe that the Christians had any churches or 
edifices constructed with a view of their meeting for 
the performance of religious exercises until after the 
persecution of Severus, about the year 230; and," 
added the Waldensian, " I could prove by quotations 
from all the fathers of the first centuries that the 
Christians did not possess a single church until the 
end of the third century." 

The Father Abbot at these words turned as red as 
fire ; and I, burning with rage and unable to contain 
myself, said to the Waldensian, 

"And as for the chains, sir, have you still other ob- 
jections to make ?" 

" None at all ; and one must be deprived of his 
senses not to agree that what I have under my eyes 
is really a chain ; but to be reasonably persuaded that 
this was Saint Peter's chain, you must, in the first 
place, know why, instead of the two chains with which 
Saint Peter was bound, there remains but one. Be- 



60 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

sides, who preserved this chain ? Was it Herod ? or 
the Jews ? or the Christians ? We should know how, 
at the ruin of Jerusalem, when every thing was de- 
stroyed, this chain alone was preserved ? As regards 
the Roman one, you must show that Peter really was 
at Rome ; for, if he never came there, how could he 
there have been chained ? Besides, I will ask, who 
preserved this chain ? Nero ? But he was not suf- 
ficiently pious for that. The Christians? But who 
would have been hardy enough to ask for it ? And if 
they had dared to do so, you know too well that at 
that epoch the worship of relics was held to be sacri- 
legious. It suffices to read TertuUian, Origen, and 
Justin the Martyr to be convinced of this. Thus, Sir 
Abbe, let us pass to the examination of some other 
monument, for this one can not in any way convince 
me." 

This first experience showed me that I had to do 
with a man better posted on the subject than myself, 
and I perceived then how judicious was the advice of 
my master. I looked for some way to extricate my- 
self from the difficulties into which I had plunged, and 
I should have been happy if he had borrowed some of 
his arguments from the Bible, so as to enable me to 
accuse him of breaking the agreement, and to escape 
with honor. For this purpose, instead of conducting 
him to the church of Saint Peter in carcere^ according 
to the plan laid down by my master, I led him to the 
one called Domine quo Yadis. 

Not far from the city, on the Appian Way, we find 
a little church constructed on the very spot where our 
Lord appeared to Peter. But in order that you may 



DOMINE QUO VADIS. 63 

have an exact knowledge of this fact, I transcribe here 
the inscription cut in marble on a tablet on the above- 
mentioned church : 

" This church, called Santa Maria delle Piante, 
and commonly Dojnine quo Yadis^ is named Delle Pi- 
ante because of the apparition of our Lord unto Peter, 
which happened on this very spot. That glorious 
apostle, having been persuaded, and, so to speak, com- 
pelled by the Christians to leave his prison and to flee 
from Rome, was proceeding along the Appian Way, 
when, reaching this spot, he met our Lord himself 
walking toward Rome. Astonished at his presence, 
he addressed him thus: Pomine, quo vadis? (Lord, 
whither goest thou ?) Jesus replied, Yenio Romam 
iterum crucifigi (I am going to Rome to be crucified 
again). Peter understood the mystery at once ; and 
he recollected that the Lord had foretold that he should 
suffer this infliction when about to give him the gov- 
ernment of his Church, and, turning round immedi- 
ately, he returned to Rome, and the Lord disappeared ; 
but in vanishing he left the print of his foot on a 
stone of the pavement ; hence this church derived the 
name of Santa Maria delle Piante^ and from the 
words of Peter that oi Pontine quo Vadis . . . 1830." 

Hardly had we arrived in front of the church when 
the Waldensian pointed out the inscription on the door, 
and begged me to read it. It reads thus : 

" Stop, traveler, and enter this temple, where thou 
shalt find the impress left by the feet of our Lord Je- 
sus Christ when he met Peter fleeing from prison. 
Thine alms are solicited for the wax and the oil, and 
to deliver a soul from Purgatory." 



64 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

He added, "I doubt much whether the Abbe will be 
more successful in the examination of this second mon- 
ument than he was in that of the first," 

We entered. On the wall, to the right, there is a 
picture of our Savior bearing his cross on his shoul- 
ders, and walking toward Rome; and on the left, you 
see Saint Peter fleeing from Rome. In the middle of 
the church there is a stone pavement representing the 
old Appian Way, and in the middle of this pavement 
is a square white stone, raised above the others, with 
the print of the feet of our Lord covered by an iron 
grating, around which is engraved the seventh verse of 
the 131st Psalm, " We worship the place where his 
feet were."* 

The Waldensian looked very grave and left the 
church; Mr. Sweetman also appeared very much shock- 
ed, and followed him, and Mr. Manson himself seemed 
to me about half satisfied. Not knowing what this 
sudden retreat meant, I left also. Then the Wal- 
densian, with a solemnity of manner that startled me, 
said, 

"Mr. Abbe, I am a Christian, and I can not endure, 
under the pretext of religion, the adorable person of 
our Lord Jesus Christ to be turned to ridicule, nor 
such an abuse made of the Word of God to incite peo- 
ple to the worship of a stone.^' 

I endeavored to justify the matter, but they all turn- 
ed against me: so I kept silence. From thence we 
passed on to the Church of St. Peter in carcere. It is 
the subterranean prison, the Mamertine itself, where 

* The quotation is made from the Yulgate ; the passage thus ren- 
dered in that version occurs in onr Bibles in the 132d Psalm. 



SAINT PETER IN CARCERE. 65 

an altar is raised, and which goes by the name of the 
Church of Saint Peter in cartere. You descend by an 
easy staircase of modern construction to the gate of the 
prison, above which you read an ancient inscription of 
the time of Augustus, when it was restored. From the 
rirst subterranean prison you go down to the second 
by a small staircase. While descending, I pointed out 
to Mr. Manson the impression of a man's head, which 
is to be seen in the wall. It originated in the follow- 
ing manner : A soldier having struck Saint Peter, the 
blow knocked his head against the wall, which, indent- 
ed by the shock, the print of the head of the apostle 
remained there. 

In the middle of this second prison there is a spring 
of water, which Peter caused to bubble up miraculous- 
ly when he converted his guards. Processus and Mar- 
tinian, whom he baptized, together with forty-eight 
other prisoners. 

Mr. Manson was filled with veneration at the sight 
of this holy spot. He desired to taste of this wonderful 
water, and preserved some in a small phial which the 
guardian sold him, to carry back to England. The Wal- 
densian said he knew very well that this was the Mam- 
ertine prison where Jugurtha died from starvation, and 
where Lentulus, Cethegus, Statilius, Sabinius, and Ce- 
parius, accomplices in the conspiration of Catiline, were 
strangled by order of Cicero ; where Sejanus was put 
to death by the order of Tiberius, together with Simon, 
son of Gioras, leader of the Jews, made prisoner by 
Titus. ''I have learned all these things from history; 
but history does not mention the imprisonment of Saint 
Peter. History teaches us that this prison was des- 



66 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

tined for prisoners of state only, but Saint Peter was not 
such. History tells us that he who entered never came 
out alive; therefore Peter was not imprisoned here; 
for, by your own supposition, this was not the place 
of his death. As to the spring, there is nothing extra- 
ordinary in that, for in this street all the houses have 
water at the same level." 

The Waldensian observed, besides, that it was ab- 
surd to pretend that there was a miraculous intervention 
to create this spring merely to baptize the guards ; for 
they could very well have brought water to be bap- 
tized, without tempting God by a useless miracle. He 
remarked that it was impossible that forty-eight pris- 
oners could have been confined in this place, together 
with Saint Peter and Saint Paul, for want of room. As 
to the print of the head of the apostle on the wall of 
the staircase, it was an evident imposture, because the 
staircase was of modern construction, and formerly 
they descended into the prison through a hole made in 
the top, which let in to the prisoners air and a little 
light. 

Upon hearing these reasons, Mr. Manson threw away 
the bottle he had bought ; and as for me, I bit my 
lips in silence, for I knew not what to reply. 

"Well," said I at length, "let us visit the place 
where Peter was crucified." 

"You refer, I presume," said the Waldensian, "to 
the famous little temple of Bramante at San Pietro 
Montorio ; but, my dear Abbe, shall you pronounce 
of your single authority upon a question, which the 
most celebrated of your antiquarians have never been 
able to decide, with regard to the place where Saint 



COLUMNS OF SAINT PETER AND SAINT PAUL. 67 

Peter died ? Eead Bosio, read Arrighi, and numerous 
others who have written on the martyrdom of Saint 
Peter, and you will see that many believe they have 
good reasons for sustaining that the martyrdom of 
Saint Peter took place on the hill of the Vatican ; oth- 
ers, between the Vatican and the Janiculiim ; others, 
finally, at the foot of the Janiculum ; and there is hard- 
ly one who believes that it took place where the little 
temple of Vignola stands. There is,^ therefore, no need 
of our discussing upon this point." 

As for me, the farther I went the more I became 
confused ; nevertheless I persevered, having no honest 
pretext for retiring. We went, therefore, to the church 
of Santa Maria della Trasjpontina, belonging to the 
Carmelite fathers. 

Having entered the church, I called the sexton to 
show us the columns of Saint Peter and Saint Paul. 
I knew very well where they were ; but I called the 
friar, hoping that he would become indignant at the 
observations made by the Waldensian, and that a dis- 
pute might ensue which would release me from my em- 
barrassment. But the very reverse happened. The 
friar conducted us to the fourth chapel on the left, 
where two marble columns, leaning against the wall 
and enveloped in wood, are preserved. An inscription 
in Latin verse says, "That the two apostles, Peter and 
Paul, being bound to these two columns, and scourged, 
the likeness of our Savior, which is on the altar, ap- 
peared, and spoke to them for a long time to console 
them in their affliction." 

The Waldensian smiled. The friar, turning round, 
said. 



68 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

"It seems you do not believe in this inscription ?'' 

"I should like," he replied, "to see some document- 
ary evidence, inasmuch as contemporary history does 
not mention the incident, and hence it appears to me 
that it would be levity to recognize this as an authen- 
tic monument without any proof. These columns were 
found in digging to lay the foundations of this church 
in 1663, fifteen centuries after the death of Saint Pe- 
ter ; who was there, then, to attest the fact ? As for 
the likeness, the imposition is far too gross to be be- 
lieved, as every body knows that images- did not begin 
to be in use among Christians before the fourth or 
fifth century." 

"You are perfectly right, sir," replied the sexton ; 
" I never believed it either. But what is to be done ? 
Every man must have his trade." 

We left the church, and, proceeding a few steps, Mr. 
Pasquali begged us to enter for a moment into the 
church of Saint James, called Scossa CavallL So we 
went in, and he showed us two blocks of marble. 

" You recognize this to be Carrara marble, without 
any manner of doubt. Very well ! Now read." 

An inscription on these blocks stated that Saint 
Helen had brought them from Jerusalem ; that one of 
them was the altar upon which Abraham bound Isaac 
for a sacrifice ; upon the other, the infant Jesus was 
placed when he was circumcised. 

"Observe," he added, "what confidence you can 
place upon the monuments preserved in Eome." 

My discouragement was increasing more and more, 
and I prayed in my heart to the Virgin Mary and the 
holy apostles that they would come to my aid. 



THE COLUMN OF THE TEMPLE. 71 

Finally, we reached Saint Peter's. As we entered 
the church, the Waldensian said, 

" Since we have spoken of columns, I want to show 
you one. Whoever has read the Bible knows that 
the famous Temple of Solomon was burned by Nebu- 
chadnezzar, and that Zerubbabel began building a sec- 
ond one on the plan of that of Solomon. I refer now 
only to the plan. Well, come and see." 

Then he conducted us to the chapel Delia Pieta^ 
and showed us a column with a marble inscription, 
which stated that this was a column of the Temple of 
Solomon, which Jesus leaned upon when he preached 
in the Temple. Then turning toward me, with grave 
composure, he said, 

'' What think you of this, Mr. Abbe T 

I was overwhelmed ; nevertheless, I gathered cour- 
age, and led the way to the magnificent altar of the 
cathedral. This superb monument is placed at the end 
of the church, opposite the principal door. Four colos- 
sal bronze statues, each twenty-four palms high, sus- 
tain lightly, and as if in triumph, the pulpit of Saint 
Peter, covered with metal, gilded and splendidly sculp- 
tured. The four colossal statues represent two doctors 
of the Latin Church, Saint Ambrosius and Saint Au- 
gustine, and two of the Greek Church, Saint Atha- 
nasius and John Chrysostom. A group of angels, 
playing in the midst of gilded clouds, surrounds a 
dove — symbol of the Holy Ghost — represented in the 
stained glass of a great elliptical window. 

This work is so truly magnificent that Mr. Sweet- 
man, who saw it for the first time, was lost in admira- 
tion. 



72 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

Mr. Manson said, 

"I hope Mr. Pasquali has nothing to say against 
this noble monument." 

"We have good reason to believe," replied the 
Waldensian, with his accustomed coolness, " that this 
pulpit, supported by four doctors of the Church, and 
annually worshiped upon a special anniversary of its 
own, is the chair of Soliman, calif of Babylon, or of 
Saladin, sultan of Jerusalem." 

Unable to brook such a sacrilegious insult, I could 
have struck this impudent heretic, but I was seized 
with a sort of convulsion ; my friends brought me 
home in a carriage, and I was compelled to take to my 
bed. 

To-morrow I shall narrate to you the rest of this 
adventure. 



THE waldensian's lettek. 73 



FIFTH LETTEE. 

Rome, January, 1847. 

My dear Eugene, — I resume my account of these 
transactions where I left off yesterday. The morning 
after the accident that happened to me in the Church 
of Saint Peter, I received a note from the Waldensian. 
I transcribe it here to give you another evidence of my 
irankness, and to show further that I conceal nothing 
from you, not even matters unfavorable to myself, but 
that I open my heart to you as to a brother. Here, 
then, is the Waldensian's letter : 

*' Mr. Abbe, the accident of yesterday has greatly 
afflicted me. I admit that I went a little too far ; in 
speaking to a sincere Catholic like yourself, I should 
have been more cautious ; therefore I beg you to par- 
don me if I have wounded your feelings by the tone 
of my remarks. Yet, although these remarks may 
have seemed severe to you, this in no way modifies 
the truth of the fact. I said that I had reasons 
for believing that this venerable chair, placed on the 
altar, whose anniversary festival is celebrated on the 
18th of January, which is called the ''Feast of the 
Chair of Saint Peter, first Pope, and first Bishop of 
Rome," was the chair of Soliman, sultan of Babylon, 
or of Saladin, sultan of Jerusalem. Now I desire, 
Mr. Abbe, to give you my reasons for this belief. 
"In the first place, I can not persuade myself that 

D 



74 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

the humble Saint Peter ever possessed a chair of this 
kind for himself. I can not suppose that for the sake 
of a chair he would have transgressed the express com- 
mand of Jesus (Matt., xx., 25-27). I honor Saint 
Peter too much to believe him a prevaricator and a 
liar. He says himself in his first Epistle, chap, v., 
V. l,that he is only an elder like those whom he is ad- 
dressing — avfJi7Tpeo(3vrepog, Observe this, I pray you : 
how is it possible to believe that he could have desired 
to possess a throne peculiar to himself in direct contra- 
diction of his own words ? But tell me, if you please, 
where he kept this chair ? In his house ? But why, 
of all his furniture, have they only preserved this chair? 
Perhaps you will say that this was his official chair in 
the church; but I have already proved to you that in 
those days there were no churches, and we see in the 
Acts and in the Epistles of the apostles that divine ser- 
vice was performed from house to house. You will cer- 
tainly not pretend that Saint Peter proceeded from 
house to house, dragging his chair after him ! 

'' But suppose for a moment (which is far from be- 
ing proved) that Saint Peter was really in Eome, and 
that he even had a distinct chair to sit upon when of- 
ficiating in church, I will ask you who preserved this 
chair? Certainly not the Christians, for it was not 
until the fourth century that they began to adore rel- 
ics. These are the reasons which prevent me from 
believing this chair to have been the one used in di- 
vine service by Saint Peter. Add to this the princi- 
pal argument drawn from the Bible and from history, 
both of which concur to establish the fact that Saint 
Peter never was in Eome, and you will be convinced 



THE waldensian's lettee. 75 

of the justice of my reasons for not having faith in this 
chair. 

"I will not obstinately maintain, what excited so 
highly your displeasure, that this chair may have be- 
longed to a Moslem. I said this on the authority of 
Lady Morgan, who states, in the fourth volume of her 
work on Italy : * The sacrilegious curiosity of the 
French [while they occupied Rome in the beginning 
of this century]* broke through all obstacles to their 
seeing the chair of Saint Peter. They actually re- 
moved its superb casket, and discovered the relic. 
The inscription was faithfully copied. The writing is 
in Arabic characters, and is the well-known confession 
of Mohammedan faith — "There is but one God, and 
Mohammed is his prophet." 

" I can not vouch for the truth of Lady Morgan's 
assertion, but all attempts to refute it have hitherto 
been puerile and inconclusive. Perhaps you know 
what is considered by many as the most witty and 
satisfactory reply; it is, that the chair in question 
can not have belonged to a Turk, because Turks do 
not use chairs. Every one knows, however, that if the 
Turks do not sit upon chairs, strictly speaking, yet 
they have richly-decorated stools, on which they place 
cushions for seats. Examine, then, this famous chair, 
and if it proves to be one of ordinary form, we will ac- 
knowledge that Lady Morgan may have been mistaken. 

" You know, Mr. Abbe, that I am exceedingly fond 
of the good Benedictine historian, Tillemont. He was 
a scholar, a monk, and an honest Catholic ; therefore 
you can not disapprove of his testimony. Well, Tille- 
mont did not believe, any more than I do, that this was 



76 EOME, CHKISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

Saint Peter's chair. ' They pretend,' says Tillemont, 
' that the episcopal chair of Saint Peter is at Eome, 
and Baronius says that it is of wood. In spite of 
this, many persons who have seen the one which it 
was intended to place solemnly on the altar in 1666, 
state positively that it is of ivory ; that its ornaments 
are not more than three or four hundred years old, and 
that the incrustations represent the twelve labors of 
Hercules.' So much for Tillemont. 

" You will object that Tillemont is contradicted by 
Baronius. I might reply that it is for you and not for 
me to reconcile these two writers ; but I have a better 
reply to make. I recollect to have read in my youth 
a little story which explains all this. 

" Cardinal Baronius having observed to Pope Clem- 
ent VIII. that the chair exposed for the veneration of 
the faithful as the chair of Saint Peter was not the 
identical one, as it could not well be presumed that 
the labors of Hercules would have been carved on the 
chair of the holy apostle, the Pope agreed to these 
reasons ; but as it was of the utmost importance that 
there should be a chair, he substituted for the wooden 
chair one of Gothic form, and it is to this chair that 
Baronius refers. But sixty years after the death of 
this cardinal, Alexander VIII., having built the fa- 
mous altar of the Cathedral, was undecided which of 
these to place in it ; not the former, because of the la- 
bors of Hercules, nor the latter, on account of its 
Gothic form, for the Gothic was unknown in apostolic 
times. Then the good Pope Alexander VIII. recol- 
lected that there existed in the depository of relics a 
chair or stool, the gift of one of the first Crusaders, 



THE JESUITS SUSPECTED. 77 

and, to cut the matter short, he had that one placed 
there. ^ 

"As for this, a chair is but a chair, my dear Mr. 
Abbe, and, being a secondary point, it is unworthy 
such great consideration. I have followed you with 
docility wherever you have chosen to lead me. Now 
I beg you will allow me to be your guide to-morrow; 
but henceforth I promise not to engage in another con- 
troversy. I must inform you that Mr. Manson has dis- 
missed his servant, w^hom I discovered to be a spy of 
the Jesuits. Adieu, then, till to-morrow. 

"Yours, Pasquali." 

These last words produced upon me a magical effect. 
I understood at once how my master had become ac- 
quainted with all my movements and discussions. This 
method, which appeared to me so unworthy, irritated 
me so much that I resolved never to be led again blind- 
fold by the fathers. 

On the other hand, the letter of Mr. Pasquali show- 
ed that I had been badly advised in my discussions. 
Why not allow me to choose for myself the proper mon- 
uments to be visited ? Why designate such question- 
able ones? Why forbid any discussion on the Bible? 
These reflections decided me to accept the invitation 
of the Waldensian, and I resolved to free myself en- 
tirely from my dependence on the Jesuits, so far as 
this debate was concerned. 

The next day my three friends called for me. "To- 
day," said the Waldensian, "we will visit some of the 
monuments which bear witness to the truth of God's 
Word ;" and he conducted us, first, to the Arch of 
Titns. 



78 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

This invaluable relic of ancient history and art 
stands at the entrance of the road called by the Ro- 
mans the Sacred Way. It is a triumphal monument 
erected by the Senate and Roman people to Titus on 
the occasion of the destruction of Jerusalem and the 
Jewish nationality. 

"There," said the Waldensian, "is the class of sa- 
cred antiquities that I admire, in preference to those 
that the disciples of Dr. Pusey run after with such en- 
thusiastic ardor." 

"Pardon me," said Mr. Manson, "ecclesiastical an- 
tiquities should not be depreciated." 

"I do not depreciate them, but I put them in their 
proper place. They are of great value to history, and, 
rightly viewed, they show the date of the introduction 
of the various changes and abuses effected in the relig- 
ious system. But to make these antiquities an ar- 
gument in theology or a rule of faith is, in my hum- 
ble opinion, an excess of folly. If a thing must be 
true because it is ancient, it would follow, as regards 
religion, that paganism, the most ancient, is the most 
true. We shall be judged by the Gospel, and not by 
antiquities. The antiquities which should be an ob- 
ject of research for the Christian are such as prove 
the truth of the Bible." 

Then he demonstrated that this monument was a 
proof of the divinity of the Word of God, as well for 
the Jews as for unbelievers. 

"Let them read," said he, "the twenty-eighth chap- 
ter of Deuteronomy, the twenty-fourth of Saint Mat- 
thew, the thirteenth of Saint Mark, and the nineteenth 
of Saint Luke, and then show them this monument 



THE PALACE OF THE C^SARS. 79 

constructed by the pagans, who were wholly ignorant 
of these prophecies, and let them deny, if they can, the 
truth of the Word of God." 

From the Arch of Titus we passed on to the neigh- 
boring Palatine Hill, to visit the ruins of the Palace 
of the Csesars. 

"This," said the Waldensian, ''is an exceedingly 
fine monument of ecclesiastical antiquity. These ru- 
ins are the remains of two great libraries, the one Greek 
and the other Latin, where all the works of antiquity 
were gathered, and which Pope Gregory I., called the 
Great, gave to the flames." 

Then he pointed out the portion of these edifices 
constructed by Augustus ; the part called by the name 
of Tiberius ; that of Caligula, and that of Nero. 

"It is written," said the Waldensian, with solem- 
nity, " 'The dwelling-place of the wicked shall come to 
naught.' This is the dwelling of those that were call- 
ed Gods, who styled themselves eternal; but He who 
reigns in the heavens laughed at them ; for, having 
given to his Son all nations as an inheritance, he broke 
the proud with a rod of iron,, and dashed them in pie- 
ces like a potter's vessel (Psalm ii.). These founda- 
tions, the only remains of the palace of those who call- 
ed themselves the masters, attest the truth of this 
word, "There is no wisdom, nor understanding, nor 
counsel against the Lord." (Proverbs, xxi., 30.) 

The serious and earnest feeling depicted upon the 
countenance of this man was very striking and attract- 
ive. Mr. Manson remained silent and thoughtful; Mr. 
Sweetman listened and appeared much gratified ; and 
as for me, I was constrained to respect the man whom, 



so EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

the evening "before, I was inclined to maltreat. Yes- 
terday, indeed, I saw in him only an adversary and a 
heretic attacking my religion ; but now he was a man 
expressing himself on religious subjects in the most 
truthful and impressive manner. But, in spite of his 
respectable character, Mr. Pasquali is nevertheless a 
lost and ruined man, since he is in error. This thought 
excited in me great compassion, and revived my zeal 
for his conversion. 

From hence we went to .the Amphitheatre of Fla- 
vins, commonly called the Coliseum. You know that 
Vespasian, after the destruction of Jerusalem, built an 
amphitheatre, the most vast and magnificent ever erect- 
ed, capable of containing one hundred thousand spec- 
tators ; it served for the games of gladiators and com- 
bats of beasts ; then, by a miracle of art, this vast 
arena was instantly converted into a lake, upon which 
flotillas of galleys engaged in fighting ; this was called 
a naumachia. You know, besides, that, during the 
times of the persecutions. Christians were exposed here 
to be devoured by ferocious beasts. To-day this am- 
phitheatre is converted into a holy place. A large 
cross is planted in the centre of the arena, and around 
it there are fourteen small chapels, where fourteen 
scenes from the Passion of our Lord are represented ; 
and this is called the Yia Crucis (the way of the cross). 
The faithful come hither to pray ; and where formerly 
nothing was heard but the roaring of lions, the lament- 
able cries of victims, and the ferocious applause of a 
brutal populace, is heard to-day only the pathetic song 
of the believers celebrating the death of the immacu- 
late Lamb of God. 



THE COLISEUM. 81 

Scarcely had we entered this vast edifice, when Mr. 
Pasquali seemed absorbed in a deep revery. "We look- 
ed at him in silence. After a few minutes he shook 
off this revery, but still was much affected. 

"Oh! dear friends," said he, ''how can I express 
the thoughts that crowd upon me at the sight of this 
monument! Its builder was but the instrument of 
the divine judgments upon a people rebellious to their 
God. The edifice itself is a memorial of the ruin of 
this people : it was a nation reduced to slavery that 
labored with their own hands to construct it, and thus 
raised a mute witness to their crime and its appropri- 
ate chastisement. 

"A Christian, Gaudentius, was the architect of this 
edifice ; and it would seem as though God had in- 
spired him with this beautiful idea, in order that, as 
no human genius had before conceived any thing so 
fair, so symmetrical, so glorious, even thus there should 
be nothing to equal it in after days." 

Then he described the horrors of the games of the 
gladiators, the ferocity of the Eoman people applaud- 
ing these massacres, the imperturbable calmness of 
those monsters called emperors who were present at 
these butcheries. Next he proceeded to recount the 
combats of the martyrs, and in colors so lively that 
tears flowed fi'om the eyes of each. After that, full of 
a new enthusiasm, he cried out, 

" Oh ! holy religion of Christ ! here thou hast tri- 
umphed in thy blood ! here thou hast manifested thy 
divine power to the whole world ! But when t\w 
Cgesars persecuted thee no longer, when they endeav- 
ored to share their throne with thee, then, like Josepli, 

D 2 



82 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

thou didst flee, leaving only thy mantle ; but despot- 
ism, vice, and fanaticism — an infernal triumvirate — 
taking hold of this mantle, clothed themselves there- 
with to reign in thy name." 

We were admiring the language, the tone, and, still 
more, the ideas of this remarkable man, when a mo- 
notonous sound was heard at the entrance of the am- 
phitheatre which interrupted him. 

It was Friday ; and we now saw approaching us a 
procession of persons covered with loose gray robes ; 
their heads and faces also covered by a hood of the 
same material, through which two holes had been made 
to enable them to see. This procession, preceded by 
a cross, followed by a barefooted Franciscan brother, 
and by a multitude of women, came to the Coliseum, 
singing the praises of the cross, and stopping to pray 
before each of the fourteen chapels. 

Mr. Manson and Mr. Sweetman turned to me to ask 
an explanation of this procession and their costume. 
I replied that it was a pious brotherhood who visited 
the Via Crucis every Friday and every Sunday. We 
paused a moment ; the friar mounted one of the ruins ; 
his colleagues formed a half circle around him, and the 
people gathered behind. We remained at some dis- 
tance, but near enough to hear what was said, and the 
friar commenced his discourse ; but his address was 
so full of silly and absurd remarks that Mr. Manson 
was shocked, while the Waldensian, happily, was too 
much absorbed in his own reflections to hear what was 
said ; so we left the amphitheatre. On returning home, 
Mr. Pasquali asked us if we were satisfied with our 
visit. We replied that we were ; but T added that 



AGEEEMENT TO EESUME THE DISCUSSION 85 

this manner of proceeding witli our discussion Iby 
means of the monuments was rather too long. On 
the other hand, I desired to convince Mr. Manson of 
his error, and consequently I proposed to resume oui* 
discussion. 

" Very well," replied the Waldensian ; ''but neither 
Mr. Sweetman nor I ought to be excluded, and the 
more because all four of us differ in our religious opin- 
ions. The reverend Abbe is a Roman Catholic ; Mr. 
Manson belongs to what is called in England the 
High-Church party, otherwise the Oxford School ; Mr. 
Sweetman is a member of the Anglican Church ; and 
I of the primitive Christian Church. The aim of our 
discussion being not to sustain this or that church, 
but to seek together the truth wherever it may be 
found, the aid of each is necessary. What do you, 
gentlemen, think of this ?" 

We all agreed, accepted the proposition, and resolved 
to commence the discussion as soon as possible. 

I admit to you, my dear Eugene, that this Walden- 
sian enchanted me ; he is a scholar, yet makes no show 
of his learning; he is a man of austere virtue, yet 
without affectation. The only reproach to be made 
against him is the error he is in ; but I hope, with 
God's help, to undeceive him. In my next letter I 
will relate to you our first discussion. Adieu. 



86 ROME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 



SIXTH LETTER. 

Rome, February, 1847. 

Dear Eugene, — I have regretted my promise to 
narrate to you fully and frankly our discussions. I 
fear lest I may injure you, and confirm, you in your 
errors ; but I have promised, and will keep my prom- 
ise. Only I heg you, before passing a definitive judg- 
ment on the debate, to wait until it be terminated, 
since, as one single letter can not contain the entire 
discussion, it might happen that the arguments of my 
adversaries should be given therein without my replies, 
and you ought to await these before forming an opin- 
ion. 

As the day for the discussion was not yet fixed, I 
took care not to be seen by Mr. Manson for several 
days. 

In this delay I had two motives : the first was to 
prepare myself for the combat ; and the second, the 
hope that something might turn up which would ex- 
clude the Waldensian from the debate, in which case 
I proposed to myself to take Mr. Manson alone, and 
discuss with him the disputed points, convert him, and 
withdraw from the debate honorably. 

I deliberated day and night upon this matter ; less, 
however, about the discussion than about some means 
for excluding the Waldensian. 

While I was in this state of perplexity, the mistress 



JESUITICAL INTRIGUE. 87 

of the house came to my room, and, with all imagin- 
able politeness, gave me to understand that I must va- 
cate it within three days. 

In vain I endeavored to learn the reason for this 
sudden ejection from the house. I could get nothing 
from her but that she was obliged to obey. 

I imagined then, without, however, being certain of it, 
that the Jesuits, who had placed me in this house, had 
ordered her to put me out. I immediately engaged a 
room in a convent, and left my old quarters the next 
day, so that Mr. Pasquali, having called on me, no 
longer found me there, nor could he find out whither I 
had gone. 

At the college, also, I observed a great change in the 
conduct of my professor. He no longer paid me any 
attention, except from time to time, when he direct- 
ed some sarcasm against the friends of heretics, and 
against such as, not having finished the course of their 
theological studies, nor having received any mission, 
still permitted themselves to dispute with heretics. On 
such occasions he cast a malignant glance toward me. 
All this irritated and disturbed me, and I determined 
never to mix again in a discussion. 

One evening, as I was alone, I heard a knock at my 
door. I opened, and beheld my three friends. 

"Poor Abbe," said the Waldensian to me, shaking 
me affectionately by the hand, " you are watched 
closely, and your good fathers, the Jesuits, would like 
to hinder your discussing with us. It is for this very 
reason that we have followed you up ; but fear noth- 
ing. We have come to make two propositions ; you 
may choose whichever you prefer. The first is to 



88 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

continue, or, rather, to commence our debates either at 
your room, or at any preferable place, on the days and 
at the hours which will be least likely to compromise 
you ; and the second is to release you fi'om your prom- 
ise, if you desire it ; but I would have you reflect 
that, if you choose this latter proposition, we shall have 
the right to infer that both you and your friends, the 
Jesuits, dread the consequences of a discussion which 
you have provoked." 

I accepted the proposal to discuss under the pru- 
dent terms proposed, that is, that one evening we 
should meet at my house, and the next at some other 
place, to prevent suspicion. 

The Waldensian desired that we should commence 
our discussion with the doctrine of justification by 
faith, and that of grace, which he called the fundamen- 
tal doctrines of the Gospel. To tell the truth, this 
doctrine of justification is the most obscure of all in 
our theology, and I was not much disposed to com- 
mence our discussion with this ; so I proposed the 
primacy of the Pope ; for, thought I, once this point 
agreed upon, Catholicism must be admitted ; but if the 
primacy of the Pope be excluded, Catholicism falls. 
After some objection, my proposal was accepted. 

Then the Waldensian, rising from his chair, said, 
''We ought to pray for the assistance of the Holy 
Spirit before commencing ;" and he invited me to 
make a prayer. 

I excused myself, saying we were not accustomed 
to extemporaneous prayer. Then he turned toward 
Mr. Manson, who replied that he had not his prayer- 
book with him. 



PRIMACY OF THE POPE. 89 

"The prayer-book of a Christian," said the Wal- 
densian, ''is a regenerate heart." 

Then raising his eyes toward heaven, and joining 
his hands, he uttered a prayer so fervent and affecting 
that it drew tears from my eyes. This prayer filled 
me with astonishment. How, thought I, can a heretic 
pray with so much faith and fervor? How^ dare he 
invoke the name of Jesus Christ with so much confi- 
dence ? 

As for me, who only knew the Protestants from 
books and from what I had heard my'masters say of 
them in their lessons and sermons, I was quite at a 
loss how to understand this man. 

The prayer ended, Mr. Pasquali observed that, as 
we proposed simply to seek the truth, and not the ob- 
stinate defense of any particular system, he thought it 
best for each one to express his ideas on the question 
proposed, and then to consult the Bible to find the 
truth. 

Then beginning, I remarked that Jesus Christ had 
appointed Saint Peter chief and prince of the apostles; 
that he had constituted him his vicar, and appointed 
him the visible head of the Church. I added that 
the dignity of Saint Peter was not purely personal, 
but that it was transmissible to his successors ; that 
thus the Bishop of Rome, being the successor of Saint 
Peter, possessed the same prerogatives as Christ had 
accorded to Peter, that is to say, primacy and infal- 
libility. 

"I agree," said Mr. Manson, "with what has been 
said on the primacy of the Pope, and I admit that the 
Bishop of Rome possesses the apostolic succession ; I 



90 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

would even willingly recognize him as the visible head 
of the Church, if his authority were not absolute, but 
limited by the ecclesiastical canons. As to his infal- 
libility^ I never can admit that, because ecclesiastical 
history furnishes us with the proof that many popes 
have erred." 

''As for me," said Mr. Sweetman, " I can not ad- 
mit so much ; in matters of religion I only recognize 
the authority of the Bible and that of the Church. 
The Bishop of Rome is a bishop like any other ; he 
may be the primate of Italy, but in no wise that of the 
Church. There would be no inconvenience, perhaps, 
in granting to the Bishop of Rome an honorary pri- 
macy, but a primacy in fact, never ! The authority 
of the Church is vested wholly in the episcopacy." 

The Waldensian hereupon drew a Bible from his 
pocket, and said, 

''For my part, I have no system in regard to this 
question, I believe that, in religious matters, systems 
often lead to error ; so I confine myself simply and 
purely to the Word of God." 

After this preamble, he said that the Bible appeared 
to him to teach four things on this question, namely : 
1st. That Jesus Christ had established a perfect equal- 
ity among the apostles ; 2d. That he had formally ex- 
cluded every idea of superiority between them. 3d. 
That the apostles never recognized any superiority in 
Saint Peter ; 4th. That Jesus Christ was alone the 
head of his Church. 

"1. I have said," he continued, " in the first place, 
that Jesus Christ had estahlished a perfect equality 
among his apostles. Follow me in the reading of the 



PRIMACY OF THE POPE. 91 

Bible, and you will see the proof in the following 
words: 'And Jesus came and spake unto them, say- 
ing. All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth : 
go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them 
in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the 
Holy Ghost ; teaching them to observe all things what- 
soever I have commanded you ; and lo ! I am with 
you alway, even unto the end of the world' (Matthew, 
xxviii., 18-20; Mark, xvi., 15; and John, xx., 21- 
23). ' Then said Jesus to them again. Peace be unto 
you ; as my Father hath sent me, even so send I you. 
And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and 
saith unto them. Receive ye the Holy Ghost ; whose- 
soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them ; and 
whosesoever sins ye retain, they are retained.' 

"In these passages not a single word is addressed 
to Peter personally ; they are to all and for all, even 
the right to bind and loose. 

" Let us pass on to another sort of proof. We read 
the following in Acts, viii., 14 : ' The apostles having 
learned that Samaria had received the word of God, 
they sent unto them Peter and John.' If Peter had 
been the chief of the apostles, he would have sent them, 
and would not have been sent by them. He says 
himself (1 Pet., v., 1) : ' The elders which are among 
you I exhort, who am also an elder.' Would he have 
used such language if he had had any authority over 
them ? Perhaps you will say that he spoke thus from 
humility ; but does humility authorize a lie ? 

" Finally, let us see if Saint Paul differs in this mat- 
ter from Christ and Peter. In the first place, he speaks 
thus of himself (2 Cor., xii., 11): 'For in nothing am 



o 



92 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

I behind the very chiefest apostles.' And in Galat., 
ii., 9, 'James, Cephas, and John gave to me the right 
hands of fellowship.' And as to Peter, Paul resists 
him openly (Galat., ii., 14). It appears to me that 
these are superabundant proofs of the perfect equality 
of the apostles, 

" 2. But let us consider whether Jesus Christ has 
not formally forbidden such supremacy. If we read 
Saint Matthew, chap, xvii., 15, 17, we will see that, 
far from the Church being subordinate to the apostles, 
or the apostles to one of their number, on the contra- 
ry, they were all dependent on the Church, that is to 
say, upon the body of believers. Farther, could Christ 
express himself more clearly than he does in Matt., 
XX., 25-27 ? Listen : ' Ye know that the princes of 
the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they 
that are great exercise authority upon them. But it 
shall not be so among you ; but whosoever will be 
great among you, let him be your minister ; and who- 
soever will be chief among you, let him be your serv- 
ant.' 

"But," he added, "with me, the most decisive 
passage is that of Saint Matthew, xxiii., 8-11 : ' But 
be not ye called Rabbi, for one is your master, even 
Christ, and all ye are brethren. And call no man 
your father upon the earth, for one is your Father, 
which is in heaven. Neither be ye called masters, for 
one is your master, even Christ. But he that is great- 
est among you shall be your servant.' Who dares, 
after that, to speak of the supremacy of Saint Peter as 
authorized by Christ ?" 

Here Mr. Manson would fain have spoken in sup- 



PRIMACY OF THE POPE. 93 

port of the supremacy, basing his argument on the an- 
tiquity of its recognition ; but the Waldensian, by ap- 
propriating to himself the argument, sustained that, if 
antiquity created a right and title, the Bible, being 
more ancient than the usage, was entitled to the high- 
est credence. 

'' 3. My third assertion," continued Mr. Pasquali, 
"being negative in character, ought to be proved by 
negative testimony, and not a single passage in the 
Bible refers to or mentions this supremacy. If it had 
been held as a doctrine — if it had been a dogma — who 
sooner than the apostles should have proclaimed and 
taught it ? Saint Paul mentions twice what is called 
the hierarchy (1 Cor., xii., 28, and Eph., iv., 11), but 
he makes no allusion to any supremacy. But what 
would you think of a professor who, in delivering a 
course on the solar system, should forget to mention 
the sun ? 

''4. As to my fourth proposition," he added, "I 
have no need to make quotations. Whoever knows 
the Bible, whoever has studied the teachings of Christ, 
knows that he alone is the head of the Church, as 
taught from the beginning to the end. Yet I will 
point out a few of the clearest passages on this sub- 
ject, namely, Eph., i., 22, 23 ; Eph., iv., 16 ; Col., i., 
18." He read these to us, and was about to cite 
others, when I inteiTupted him to say it was use- 
less ; that no one denied that Christ was the head of 
the Church, but that none of these passages excluded 
the idea of the supremacy of the Pope. Christ, in- 
deed, is the head of the Church, but he is in heaven 
in glory, and the Pope holds his place on the earth. 



94 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

To a visible Church a visible head is necessary ; call 
him the substituted or secondary head, this matters 
little, but he is always a head. 

Mr. Pasquali rejoined that our object was now not 
to dispute, but to seek the truth in the Bible, and he 
defied any one to find a single word that could author- 
ize the Pope to call himself the Vicar of Jesus Christ. 

Mr. Manson, founding his argument on the belief of 
the primitive Church, quoted Irenseus ; but Mr. Pas- 
quali, interrupting him, said, "The primitive Church 
is the Church of the Bible — the Church of apostolic 
times ; and if you should succeed in demonstrating by 
your authority the existence of an authority opposed 
to that of the Bible, you will only have shown an an- 
cient error, and nothing more." 

However dissatisfied I might be with the conduct 
of the father Jesuits toward me, I could not help think- 
ing what one of them had told me, that when a Prot- 
estant argues from the Bible he will no longer listen 
to reason, and I would have been delighted to see Mr. 
Manson join in the contest ; but he remained silent, and 
Mr. Pasquali continued thus : 

" There is nothing new under the sun ; even in the 
time of Saint Paul the mystery of iniquity commenced, 
and he appeared to have foreseen this invention of the 
scholastics when he wrote to the Ephesians (v. 23): 
' The husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ 
i*s the head of the Church.' What do you think? 
Could you say the husband is th^ principal head, and 
the wife the secondary head ? 

" Does it not signify rather that as the husband is 
the sole head of the wife, so Christ is the sole head of 



THE TEACHER OF THEOLOGY. 95 

the Church? But see what he says further, 1 Cor., 
iii., 11 : 'For other foundation can no man lay than 
that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.' And, to al- 
low no error to creep in, he designated by what title 
Peter formed a part of the edifice (Gal., ii., 9). He 
was a pillar of this Church, but only a pillar, and 
nothing more or less, as were also James, John, and 
the other apostles." 

As I wanted to study the question mol-e closely be- 
fore risking myself in a controversy of this nature, I 
seized the pretext of the lateness of the hour, and that 
the convent would soon be closed, to proceed no far- 
ther. Having, therefore, fixed upon the hour of meet- 
ing for the next day, we separated. 

As soon as the gentlemen were gone, I felt the need 
of counsel and support ; but as I could no longer have 
recourse to my master, I thought I would address my- 
self to the teacher of theology in the convent where I 
lived ; so I went to his room. I laid before him the 
whole case from the beginning ; and he, after having 
thought over it, replied, 

" The remedy is very easy ; complain of the Wal- 
densian at the Inquisition, and the holy tribunal will 
get you out of this afikir." 

I was seized with horror at the mere idea ; but the 
teacher sustained that the Waldensian, being an Ital- 
ian, was under the jurisdiction of the Inquisition, and 
that I was obliged in conscience to denounce him ; he 
added, '' He is a dogmatizing heretic ; you ought ab- 
solutely to denounce him, otherwise you run the risk 
of being denounced yourself." 

I passed the entire night without closing my eyes, 






96 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

SO great was my agitation ; I would rather endure 
any thing than commit a bad action ; and to denounce 
Mr. Pasquali, to have him thrown into prison, appeared 
to me an act of horrible perfidy. On the other hand, 
I said to myself, If it is true that I ought in con- 
science to accuse him under the penalty of committing 
a mortal sin, ought I not to do it however much it 
may cost me ? 

As soon as morning came, I returned once more to 
the good father, to come to a better .understanding 
about this matter. 

" My son," said he, " I will do you no injury, but 
perhaps some one else may denounce you. You are 
a stranger, unacquainted with Rome, and you have 
been conversing with Protestants as if you were at 
Geneva : here it is an entirely different thing." 

"But," I replied, "I can not believe that I have 
committed a crime that could be denounced to the In- 
quisition in endeavoring to convert three Protestants." 

''My dear friend, you judge of matters as if you 
were in your own country. There, where the holy 
Catholic religion is not dominant, the Church can nol 
put forth all her energies ; but here, although she 
adapts herself somewhat to the times in which we live, 
yet she exercises her laws and rights. And do you 
know what laws can be applied to your case ? They 
are these : The holy Church has the right to dispose 
of her missionaries and to make proselytes every 
where, because truth resides in her alone. She may 
manifest and propagate her doctrines, but if a her- 
etic seeks to spread his doctrines, the holy Church 
has a right to chastise him, and Catholics are under 



INDEPENDENCE. 97 

the obligation of denouncing him, especially if the her- 
etic is hardy enough to propagate his opinions in a 
place where there exists a holy tribunal of the Inqui- 
sition. The holy tribunal then is governed by the 
counsels of prudence ; if the heretic be an Englishman 
or Frenchman, he is quietly sent away by means of the 
police ; if he be a Swiss, or belong to some other na- 
tion little to be feared, then use is made of all the 
holy rigor of the law. Thus you see your case is 
quite serious, and especially so in these times, when 
Pius IX. has commanded the holy tribunal to act with 
the utmost severity; and since his elevation to the 
papal chair the prisons have become pretty nearly fill- 
ed again." 

"But, my father," said I, '' Canon T., secretary of 
the vicar-cardinal, has authorized me to discuss with 
these Protestants." 

" Canon T.," added the master, *' is a good man, but 
he is ignorant of the laws of the Inquisition ; as for 
that, do as you like, but recollect I have warned you." 

Dear Eugene, I can not have faith in what this fa- 
ther told me ; I believe he only did it to terrify me. 
No, no, it is not possible that the holy Catholic Church, 
which is a mother full of love for her children, can 
nourish such unjust and cruel sentiments. 

Perceiving soon that this priest received me unwill- 
ingly when I sought counsel from him, I determined 
to continue my discussion without asking advice, or 
mentioning it to any one. So I went to the appoint- 
ed place. But my sheet is filled, and I will tell you 
the rest in my next. Adieu. 

Henry, 
E 



98 KOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 



SEVENTH LETTEE. 

Rome, February, 1847. 

My dear Eugene, — We were to have met in the 
house of Mr. Manson the evening following our first 
conversation ; but, recollecting that I lived in a con- 
vent, and that I ran the risk of staying out too late to 
return, I went a little after midday to Mr. Manson's to 
excuse myself, and to choose another hour for our meet- 
ing. 

I found the three friends together. They were ex- 
ceedingly glad to see me, and proposed my accompany- 
ing them upon a quiet promenade where we could con- 
tinue peaceably our conversation. 

We were then in the height of the Carnival ; but 
you have no idea what Rome is in Carnival, and I ad- 
mit that to us strangers it is very shocking. The ex- 
cessive dissipation displayed at the theatres and balls, 
the races, the carriages and masquerades, cause the ruin 
of a great many families ; and the orgies and debauch- 
ery during these days destroy the health of great 
numbers of persons. 

I will tell you how the Carnival is passed in Eome. 

At one o'clock the bell of the Capitol gives the sig- 
nal permitting persons to go out masked. Soon after, 
the streets are inundated with a masked population, in 
the most fancy costumes, giving themselves up to ev- 
ery folly. At sunset the horse-races take place, and 
prizes of considerable value are given to the victor. 



THE CARNIVAL. 99 

This race is presided over by the Roman Senate 
with great solemnity. The shadow of that Senate, at 
whose decrees formerly the world trembled, is reduced 
to-day to awarding a prize to the triumphant racer! 

The race finished, the people pursue their bacchana- 
lian orgies in the taverns, cafes, and streets, while the 
aristocracy go to dinner. Two hours later the theatres 
are opened, and at midnight, soon after the play, the 
public balls commence. These balls are called here 
" conversazioni," and they last till daylight. Then all 
go home to sleep till noon, and the next day they be- 
gin again. 

Thus the eight days of the Carnival are spent in 
Rome. 

To tell you the truth, what shocked me particularly 
was to see the clergy take part in these amusements. 
I do not mean to say that ecclesiastics go into the 
street masked ; if one of them does so, he is reprimand- 
ed ; but during the Carnival there are theatrical per- 
formances and balls in almost all the nunneries ; and 
in nearly all the colleges there is a theatre which is 
attended by priests, monks, bishops, and cardinals. 

To us, who are accustomed to the serious habits of 
our country, these things appear both strange and cul- 
pable, but here they are looked upon as very innocent. 

But let us return to the point in question. To es- 
cape from this tumult and whirl, we went out of the city 
by the Porta Pia. This beautiful resoii: is absolute- 
ly deserted during Carnival ; you may, perhaps, meet 
some old cardinal or solitary Jesuit. However, to be 
still less interrupted in our discussion, we entered the 
magnificent Villa Patrizzi, and seated ourselves in the 



100 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

open square opposite this palace, wliicli is inhabited 
during the holidays, 

"Gentlemen," said the Waldensian, "before com- 
mencing our discussion, let us first pray ;" and, tak- 
ing a Bible from his pocket, he stood up, and, uncov- 
ering his head, read from chapter xi. of Saint Luke, 
from the 9th to the 13th verse, and, after a short 
meditation on the subject, made a fervent prayer in 
calling the Holy Spirit to our aid, which affected me 
profoundly. Oh ! what a rich acquisition he would be 
for us, if this man could be attracted to our holy re- 
ligion ! 

The prayer ended, the Waldensian asked if there 
were any passage in the Bible which stated more clear- 
ly the truth on the subject discussed yesterday. 

Mr. Sweetman said that he had some objections to 
offer with respect to the authority of the Church ; but 
as this was not the present subject of discussion, he 
reserved the statement of his objections till the mo- 
ment came for considering the Church. 

"As for the Pope," said he, "I acknowledge him as 
the Bishop of Borne and nothing more, as I recognize 
in the same way the Bishop of London." 

Mr.Manson said, "No further remarks could be made 
if the passages cited by Mr. Pasquali were to be in- 
terpreted as he pretended. But, since all the fathers 
of the primitive Church agree in admitting the suprem- 
acy of the Pope, one is forced to draw this conclusion 
— either the whole ancient Church was deceived, or else 
you are deceived. You can not deny that all the fa- 
thers have recognized the primacy of the Pope, neither 
can you affirm that the whole ancient Church was mis- 



PEIMACY OF THE POPE. 103 

taken; therefore you ought to admit tliat you are in 
error. Yet let us understand each other. I do not 
participate in the opinion of the Roman theologians, 
-who extend the privilege of this primacy to making 
the Pope a second God ; I do not, with the primacy, 
grant infallibility besides." 

I was awaiting anxiously the reply of the Walden- 
sian to this argument ; but he, turning to me, said, 

''And you, JVIr. Abbe, have you nothing to oppose 
to that?" 

"I have, it is true, several remarks to add," I re- 
plied, " but I should like first to hear your reply to 
Mr. Manson's argument." 

But Mr. Pasquali said, 

"As I believe your reasons differ but slightly from 
those of Mr. Manson, I will reserve my reply, which 
will serve at the same time for both." 

Then I commenced with the celebrated passage of 
Saint Matthew, chap, xvi., 18, 19: "And I say also 
unto thee that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will 
build my Church ; and the gates of hell shall not pre- 
vail against it. And I will give unto thee the keys 
of the kingdom of heaven ; and whatsoever thou shalt 
loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven." 

I observed, 

"1. That Christ, in saying ' on this rock I will 
build my Church,' and at the same time designating 
Peter, signified that the Church of Christ was founded 
on Peter — that is to say, that Christ is really the prin- 
cipal foundation or the invisible rock, but that Peter 
is the visible foundation — that is, the head. 

"2. In the same passage the keys of the kingdom 



104 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

of heaven are promised to Peter only, with full author- 
ity to bind and to loose ; and I defy the Protestants," 
I added, ''to show me a single passage in which the 
keys of the kingdom of lieaven, which are the sym- 
bols of absolute authority, were promised to any oth- 
er than to Peter alone. Peter, therefore, has received 
from Jesus Christ the supremacy of his whole Church ; 
' and why,' observes the Cardinal Bellarmine, ' if, then, 
these words did not signify the authority given to 
Peter, why did the Lord address them to him only?' " 

I wanted to cite some other passages from the Bi- 
ble, but the Waldensian interrupted me, and said that, 
before passing to other subjects, we ought first fully to 
discuss this one. - 

" Your first argument on this passage," said he, " is 
based on the supposition that Peter is the rock on 
which Christ said his Church should be founded ; but 
this is evidently false, for the New Testament is full 
of declarations that prove that Christ, and Christ alone, 
is the stone whereupon his Church is founded. Saint 
Peter himself declares it openly at two different times : 
read Acts, iv., 4 ; 1 Peter, ii., 4, 6. 

'' Besides, if you place in parallel the 18th and 16th 
verses of Matt, xvi., where Simon Peter had just re- 
plied to this question of Christ's, ' Whom say ye that 
I am ?' ' Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living 
God,' you will see that Christ intended to designate 
himself when he said, 'Upon this rock I will build my 
Church.'" 

I am going to give you his mode of constructing 
this passage, for it appears to me a novel one. This 
is his explanation : 



PEIMACY OF THE POPE. 105 

He remarked, in the first place, that in Syriac^ which 
was probably the language spoken by Jesus Christ, 
the word cepha used by him signifies a stone; and Si- 
mon, named by Jesus Cepha^ or, as we say, Cephas^ 
should also be translated by Peter (stone) ; and here 
an ambiguity would have occurred had not the inspired 
Greek text of the Gospel remedied it. 

For, although the Greek word nerpog (petros) signi- 
fies both a stone and the name of Peter ^ and it would 
have been quite elegant in Greek to say 'Ett^ tovtg) tw 
Xlerpa), that is, on this Peter, if our Lord really had 
had the intention of founding his Church on his apos- 
tle ; nevertheless, the Evangelist, or the Holy Spirit 
that directed his pen, desiring that no doubt should 
remain as to the proper interpretation of this passage, 
wrote, 'Enl ravrxj r^ Tzerpa, and on this stone, etc. 

''This is not my own interpretation," added Pas- 
quali, ''but that of a person whose authority none of 
you will contest ; it is by Saint Augustine, who, in his 
book of Retractations, chapter xxi., says, ' This is the 
reason why Christ did not say to him. Thou art a 
stone (petros), but Thou art Peter (Petros). Christ 
was the stone, and Simon having confessed that Christ 
was the Son of God, he was called Peter. '^ " 

"Yet," added I, "in other parts of his work Saint 
Augustine says just the contrary." 

" I should like," said the Waldensian, " to have you 
pay attention, Mr. Abbe, to the peculiar manner in 
which the Roman theologians act in relation to the fa- 
thers. While, on the one hand, they exalt their au- 
thority to the highest theological dignity, on the other 
hand they care little about placing them in contradic- 

E 2 



106 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

tion with themselves whenever this suits their pur- 
pose. 

" We Waldenses, primitive Christians, who only 
recognize the fathers as simple teachers, subject to er- 
ror, and only admit their authority in doctrinal mat- 
ters in so far as they harmonize with the rule of faith, 
yet respect them more than do the Roman Catholics. 
For instance, the passage which I quote from Saint 
Augustine shows that he erred in good faith when he 
sustained the primacy of Saint Peter, but not that he 
contradicted himself. The book of Retractations of 
Saint Augustine ought to be in the hands of every one 
who desires to engage in controversy. 

"This theologian advanced many things in the heat 
of discussion which later, after a greater maturity of 
thought, he acknowledged that a Christian ought not 
to sustain. Then, a little before his death, he com- 
posed the book of Retractations, where he withdraws 
all his errors of doctrine, as in his book of Confessions 
he deplored the errors of his youth. On this account, 
the passage which I cited, being extracted from his 
book of Retractations, is of much the greater weight, 
being more maturely reflected upon. 
-V "For the same reason, all the other passages of Saint 
Augustine which can be quoted in favor of the primacy 
of Saint Peter are annulled by this retractation." 

" Your interpretation," said Mr. Manson, " is entire- 
ly opposed to that of the other fathers." 

" Even if it were so," replied the Waldensian, " you 
should remember that we ought not to seek the truth 
in the fathers, but in the Word of God. Yet I will 
undertake to show you that such is not the case ; but 



PRIMACY OF THE POPE. 107 

I can not do it to-day, not having a whole library in 
my memory. For the moment, let us pursue this in- 
terpretation of the Bible by means of the Bible. 

"Remark that Jesus had hardly pronounced the 
words in question when he foretold to his disciples his 
death close at hand ; and Peter, in a transport of zeal 
which certainly was not according to knowledge, en- 
deavored to dissuade Jesus from this work of redemp- 
tion. Then Jesus, turning toward him, said, ' Get 
thee behind me, Satan ; thou art an offense unto me ; 
for thou savorest not the things that be of God, but 
those that be of men.' — Matthew, xvi., 23. Suppose 
that by the preceding words Jesus had really estab- 
lished him head of his Church, what inference must 
we draw ? That Jesus called the first Pope Satan at 
the very moment of his installation, and that the first 
words of this pope proficred since the conferment of 
his new dignity drew on him the reproach of Jesus as 
being a stumbling-block." 

"All this would show," I replied, "that the prom- 
ise of Jesus to Peter is without meaning." 

"God preserve me from such a thought," replied he; 
"this promise of Jesus Christ is the most precious 
that he ever made to his Church ; it evinces the char- 
acteristic by which that Church proves itself to be his 
own. In effect, Jesus, in promising to build his Church 
on this rock, that is to say, on the absolute confession 
of his divinity-r-a confession which proceeds not from 
a revelation made by flesh and blood, that is to say, 
fi-'om human knowledge, but from a revelation of the 
Father, that is to say, an entire dependence on the 
Word of God — in promising this, I say, Jesus prom- 



108 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

ised that all those who founded themselves on this 
rock would form the Church of Christ, against whom 
the gates of hell could never prevail." 

^'Dear Mr. Pasquali," said Mr. Manson, '^I do not 
adhere entirely to the Roman doctrine, but this pas- 
sage contains a promise made by Jesus to Saint Peter, 
and to Peter alone, so that we must conclude either 
that Jesus did not keep his promise, which would be 
an impiety, or that Peter really was established, in one 
sense at least, as the foundation of the Church ; I do 
not pretend as the principal foundation, but at least as 
the secondary or administering one." 

" Let us endeavor to find," continued Pasquali, 
" but always according to the Bible, what this certain 
sense is by which you believe Peter was established 
the foundation of the Church, and then all difficulty 
will disappear. Is Peter perhaps the basis of the 
Church in this sense, that it reposes on Peter alone to 
the exclusion of the other prophets ? This is the gen- 
eral sense recognized by Papists ; but the Word of 
God says that the Church is founded on the apostles 
and the prophets (Eph., ii., 20). Here not only Saint 
Peter, but all the other apostles, are placed on the same 
footing as regards the basis of the Church. In what 
sense, then, could Saint Peter be this foundation ? 
Perhaps that Peter is the principal basis ? But that 
would be a blasphemy, since a sinner would thus be 
substituted for the Son of God, who has redeemed the 
Church by his very blood. * For other foundation can 
no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ' 
(1 Cor., iii., 11). There is only one other significa- 
tion, which is, that Peter was the foundation of the 



PRIMACY OF THE POPE. 109 

Church, as James and John, who were also reputed col- 
umns of it (Gal., ii.,9), and as were and are the other 
apostles. Jesus is the corner stone ; the twelve apos- 
tles are the first twelve stones placed on this founda- 
tion. Saint John says (Rev., xxi., 14), ' The wall of 
the city had twelve foundations, and in them the names 
of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.' In this sense 
only could Saint Peter call himself the foundation of 
the Church." 

"If this were so," said I, "Jesus would have ad- 
dressed his discourse to all his disciples, and not to 
Peter only ; but, having addressed it to Peter alone, 
it is clear that there was question of a privilege which 
concerned him only." 

"I could reply," said the Waldensian, "that Peter 
having replied in the name of all to the question ad- 
dressed by Jesus to all the disciples (Matt., xvi., 13), 
it was on that account that Jesus addressed him con- 
cerning that which referred to them all. But perhaps 
the Abbe and Mr. Manson will prefer the reply made 
to this question by Saint Cyprian, in his book on the 
Unity of the Church. ' To manifest unity, Jesus de- 
cided by his authority that this unity should com- 
mence in one of the disciples. All the other apostles 
participated in the same honor and power as Saint Pe- 
ter. But the commencement of this unity must spring 
from one of them, to show the Church to be one;'' 
therefore Jesus addressed his discourse to Peter, to 
demonstrate that, although the apostles were equal in 
honor and power, yet their power was one^ and should 
be exercised in common, so that the faithful might say 
we are of Christ, and not of Peter, of Paul, of John, etc." 



110 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

At this point my face lighted up with joy. I thought 
I could accuse the Waldensian of bad faith in having 
mutilated this passage of Saint Cyprian. 

''Behold," said I, ''the good faith of the enemies 
of the Church ! They mutilate passages, and omit 
what would be against them so as to appear to be in 
the right. Why, Mr. Pasquali, did you not cite what 
follows in this passage of Saint Cyprian ? ' And the 
primacy was given to Peter, to prove that there is only 
one Church of Christ and only one chair.' " 

" I hoped," continued the Waldensian, " that the 
abbe, for the honor of the cause he sustains, would 
have kept silent. The words which he has added to 
the passage of Cyprian may be found in the book of 
lessons dictated by his professor, and perhaps he will 
find them in some falsified edition of the same father, 
but they are a manifest interpolation : 

"1st. Because in the most ancient and authentic 
manuscripts of Saint Cyprian the words are not found. 

"2d. They can not be by Cyprian, because they 
are contrary to the whole aim of his book, designed to 
demonstrate the unity of the Church only, and not the 
primacy of Saint Peter---a doctrine of which, as we 
>shall see, he was the declared adversary. 

"3d. They are not by Cyprian, because he would 
not thus have contradicted himself. How, indeed, 
could Cyprian have said that Peter possessed the pri- 
macy, when, only a line above, he said that all the 
apostles were absolutely equal in honor and power ?" 

I remained mute at this observation, which took me 
so much by surprise. My confusion became evident 
to all, when two of the noble guards on horseback, 



THE DISCUSSION INTERRUPTED. 113 

sword in hand and on full gallop, announced tlie pres- 
ence of the Pope in the villa. 

The Pope had descended from his carriage, and was 
coming on foot toward the palace. We all stood up 
the moment he passed before us. I prostrated my- 
self, and the Holy Father had the goodness to permit 
me to kiss his feet. He cast a glance at my three- 
friends, who remained standing, with heads uncovered, 
Mr. Manson slightly bowing his head. After the 
Pope had passed, one of the prelates of his retinue led 
me aside and inquired who my companions were. I 
told him they were foreigners and Protestants. He 
then rejoined the procession. 

The Pope entered the palace and went to the bill- 
iard saloon, where he began to play with his guards 
and prelates ;^ but soon one of the guards came and 
ordered us to leave the villa, and we were obliged to 
obey. 

When we had left the villa, the Waldensian ob- 
served to me, 

"As I saw you prostrated before the Pope, I recalled 
to mind a certain passage of the Bible." 

And he opened at the tenth chapter of the Acts of 
the Apostles, verses 25 and 26. "And as Peter was 
coming in, Cornelius met him, and fell down at his 
feet, and worshiped him. But Peter took him up, 
saying. Stand up ; I myself also am a man." I want- 
ed to reply, but I thought it more pnident to leave 
these gentlemen, and not be seen in their company. 
They entered, therefore, into the city by the Gate Pius, 

1 Pius IX., in 1846 and 1847, went often to the Villa Patrizzi to 
play billiards with his guards and prelates. 



114 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

while I followed along by the wall, and entered by 
the Gate Salara. 

I am not sure that our conferences will be resumed, 
as we took leave of each other without making a new 
appointment ; but if our discussion does continue, I 
will inform you immediately. 

Believe me always yours affectionately, 

Henry. 



THE PUSEYITE's LETTER. 115 



EIGHTH LETTER 

Rome, March, 1847. 
My dear Eugene, — After our last meeting, several 
days passed without my hearing from the three friends. 
Finally, one day, I received from Mr. Manson a letter, 
of which I send a copy : 

*' Monsieur l'Abbe, — Since the day we were to- 
gether at the Villa Patrizzi, a number of very remark- 
able things have happened, which have greatly embar- 
rassed me, and exercised a powerful influence on my 
convictions. 

"You know that I am no Roman Catholic, but 
neither am I a fanatical Protestant in my judgment of 
the state of things in Rome. Now, on the very even- 
ing that we separated from you, Mr. Pasquali informed 
me that the object of his remaining in Rome was to 
show this metropolis to Mr. Sweetman in a religious 
point of view. 

" 'To-morrow,' said he, 'we shall begin our excur- 
sions, and we should be delighted to have you join us.' 

" I accepted his ofl*er ; and he added that, since we 
had commenced our discussions with the primacy of 
the Pope, our excursions should be directed so as to 
become acquainted with the use the Pope makes of 
this supremacy. 

" The next morning we met, and visited a church, 
whose name I will not mention for the moment. We 



116 ROME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

inquired for the curate, an old acquaintance of Mr. 
Pasquali, and he received us most cordially. 

"Mr. Pasquali begged him to accompany us to vis- 
it the ecclesiastical congregations ; but the curate re- 
plied that, this being the last day of the Carnival, 
every thing was closed. Yet he asked us the object 
we had in view in desiring to visit them. 

" 'We are strangers,' said Mr. Pasquali, ^ and we 
are desirous of seeing how the Pope, by means of these 
congregations, exercises his supremacy.' 

"Then the curate inquired of Mr. Pasquali who we 
were ; and being informed, he said, 'Very well ; I see 
that I can place confidence in you; but at this hour 
I am accustomed to receive the visits of my congrega- 
tion. I shall soon be rid of them.' He invited us, 
while waiting, to be present at his audience. 

"For this purpose we entered a chamber on the 
ground floor, above which the name Parrochietta was 
written. About fifty men and women of the common 
people were waiting outside for the audience to com- 
mence. A pale and repulsive-looking man stood at 
the door of the chamber, to introduce, one at a time, the 
persons without. I asked who this man was, and the 
curate told me that he was the undertaker of the par- 
ish, and joined to the office of burying the dead that 
of assisting the curate in the quality of a commission- 
er for things concerning the poor. 

"Having entered the chamber, the curate took his 
seat in a large chair, and begged us to be seated at his 
side. 

" Before opening the audience the sacristan was ad- 
mitted. He brought a quantity of cards to be signed 



THE PUSEYITE's LETTER. 117 

by the curate ; they were certificates to enable the 
bearers to obtain pensions or subsidies from certain 
pubHc funds ; certificates of sickness to get permission 
to eat during Lent, and other similar things. Once 
rid of the sexton, the parishioners entered in their 
proper order: one demanded a permission to carry 
arms prohibited by law ; another, to keep a fowling- 
piece ; a third, a certificate to enable him to obtain an 
office ; a fourth, a permission to get a passport ; a lady, 
elegantly dressed in silk, and covered with jewels, de- 
manded the curate to attest her poverty, so that she 
might gain a process she was engaged in against her 
husband, and the curate did as he was desired. We 
looked at each other with astonishment. After the 
lady had gone, the curate said to us, ' If I had refused 
the demand of this lady I should have drawn on my- 
self a terrible persecution : she is protected against her 
husband by Monsignior A., who has encouraged her 
to separate from him.' 

" ' But how can you make a false certificate V asked 
Mr. Pasquali. 

" ' In the first place, I could reply,' added the curate, 
' that my certificate is only a simple formality required 
by law, and is not prejudicial to any one. In this 
case, supposing the certificate were false, the telling of 
an innocent lie to guarantee one's self from a certain 
persecution is not a sin, or, if it is one, it is only a 
venial one. In the second place, I w^U inform you 
that we curates have discovered the means of making 
a false certificate without lying. This is the certifi- 
cate I made for her: ''I, the undersigned, attest that 
Madame N. is, as far as is known to me, a poor per- 



118 HOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

son." By using this formula nothing is risked, since, 
not possessing evident proof of her riches, I must sup- 
pose that what she says of her poverty is true ; and, 
moreover, the principle is recognized among us that a 
certificate of indigence can be given to the richest per- 
sons conscientiously ; for the rich man may call him- 
self poor in comparison with one richer than he, and 
the most wealthy may be but poor in comparison with 
his desires. As for myself,' he continued, ' I never 
was a partisan of these doctrines ; but what can be 
done? In Rome, for the least thing a certificate is 
necessary ; if we should refuse it, we should run the 
risk of being assassinated, which happened lately to 
three of my friends, and to many others, who got off, 
however, after being badly beaten.' 

" After this he made a sign to the sexton to admit 
singly the other persons who were waiting. 

" I will not enter into the details of the rest of this 
audience. I will only observe in general that I was 
greatly shocked. 

''For instance, one man had recourse to the curate 
for the bad conduct of his wife, and wanted him to 
point out a remedy. A woman complained of the bad 
conduct of her husband. Another accused her neigh- 
bor of having insulted her, and this one, who was pres- 
ent, protested with great earnestness that the first 
woman lied, and that it was she who had insulted her 
the first ; and they would have come to blows if the 
sexton had not put them out by order of the curate. 
A young girl came in tears to accuse her seducer, and 
begged that he might be obliged to marry her. 

" These interviews being ended, the curate conduct- 



THE PUSEYITE'S LETTER. 119 

ed us into his apartment, and there I asked him if 
these audiences took place every day. 

" 'Even twice a day,' he replied, 'except on Sun- 
days, when there is only one.' 

" Mr. Pasquali having asked him to explain to us 
the functions of the clergy of Rome, he told us the of- 
fice of a curate was extremely delicate, for it stands in 
close relations with all the tribunals, and especially 
with the vicariate. The tribunal of the vice-cardinal of 
Rome, called the vicariate, is at once a police court and 
a tribunal ; it inspects the conduct of the priests, and 
serves as a tribunal for all sorts of abandoned women ! 
The vicariate decides nothing before hearing the curate. 
To put on the clerical robe, to take holy orders, to be 
permitted to say mass, a certificate of the curate is re- 
quired. The curate should secretly give information 
at the vicar's office once a year respecting the conduct 
of all the priests who live within the bounds of his 
parish ; and as soon as he knows of a fault committed 
by a priest or other ecclesiastic, he is obliged to inform 
against him immediately. When an accusation is 
made against a priest, no proceedings are commenced 
till information has been given by the curate. In a 
word, a curate acts as an agent of the police over 
priests. 

" 'If such is the case,' said Mr. Sweetman, 'how 
does it happen that the culpable immoralities of the 
priests remain so often unpunished ?' 

" ' There are two reasons for that,' said the curate ; 
' the first is, that the vicar never proceeds against a 
priest unless there be scandal, that is, unless the neigh- 
bors complain. Consequently, if a priest have at his 



120 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

house a sister-in-law, or niece, or governess, or if he 
frequents a house with bad intentions, if he only knows 
how to gain over his neighbors by money or protec- 
tion, impose on them by hypocrisy, or make them un- 
easy in their office or position, the vicar, although ac- 
quainted with all this, will nevertheless shut his eyes 
thereto, so as not to initiate the public in these secret 
misdemeanors. The second reason is, that many of 
these complaints are considered as calumnies. For in- 
stance, a priest is guardian or administrator for some 
ward, and he takes a criminal advantage of his posi- 
tion ; now, if he is a priest who shows great zeal in 
religion, then, for the good of religion, the complaint 
should be stigmatized as a calumny ; for what would 
the people say if they knew that the most zealous 
priests are sometimes the worst V 

" Dear Abbe, you could not well believe the effect 
that these revelations of the curate had upon me. Mr. 
Pasquali looked at me in his peculiar way, and the cu- 
rate continued : 

" ' The tribunal of the vicar takes cognizance of the 
misconduct of all the abandoned women, and of im- 
moralities generally. The prostitutes are within the 
jurisdiction of the cardinal-vicar, and each curate has 
a register of all those who live within the limits of his 
parish.' 

" As a proof of this, he took out of a drawer a little 
register, on which the names of all such women were 
inscribed in alphabetical order. 

" 'When a curate,' he continued, ' is tired of one of 
these women, he has only to denounce her to the vicar, 
and, if she have not powerful protectors, she is imrae- 



THE PUSEYITE's LETTEE. 121 

diately imprisoned or exiled. But she can not be sub- 
ject to either if the curate does not complain of her.' 

*''But,'I asked, 'does the Pope know of these 
things?' 

" ' The Pope,' he replied, ' was once a bishop, and 
knows them even better than I ; but we have a prin- 
ciple on which the whole conduct of the tribunal of the 
vicariat is founded, and which is, as it were, the pivot 
of our whole system, and it is this : Of two evils, 
choose the lesser one.' 

" 'This principle is impious, 'interrupted Mr. Sweet- 
man; 'Saint Paul says {Rom.,iii., 8) that the condem- 
nation of such as admit it is just.' 

" ' As to that,' rejoined the curate, ' we must draw a 
distinction : Saint Paul speaks of those who do evil 
that good may come ; but we do not say that one ought 
to do evil, but that we may permit it to be done. There 
is a difference between doing evil and permitting evil 
to be done.' 

" ' Saint Paul says,' added Mr. Sweetman, ' that those 
who approve or permit evil are as culpable as those 
who do it' (Eom., i., 32). 

" The curate did not give himself the trouble to re- 
ply to this last quotation, although he appeared consid- 
erably embarrassed ; but he continued to relate to us 
that the tribunal of the vicar did not wholly occupy a 
curate of Rome, but that, besides, he had to do with all 
the tribunals and congregations ; thus no one could ob- 
tain employment, a passport, a license, without a cer- 
tificate of the curate ; a sick person can not be admit- 
ted into a hospital, a young woman obtain dowry, no 
individual can visit his parents in prison, no poor man 

F 



122 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

can obtain relief, nor widow toucli the pension due to her 
on her husband's account — ' in a word, our certificate 
is necessary for all these things. Besides, we must al- 
ways be ready to answer to the police, to the Inquisi- 
tion, to the tribunals, when they demand information 
on any subject.' 

" ' But how do you manage,' I added, 'to know the 
conduct of all your parishioners ?' 

" 'Gentlemen,' he replied, 'it is a horrible secret, that 
I should never have revealed had you not been the 
friends of Mr. Pasquali. I suffer, gentlemen, under a 
weight of iniquity that I can no longer support, and 
I pray to God to show me the way to throw it off. 
The confessional, gentlemen, is the principal means of 
police which we make use of. But, note well, it is not 
our parishioners who confess to us ; they are afraid to 
confess to their curate, so the Roman curate hears few- 
er confessions than any other priest. But the curate 
employs seven or eight female devotees within his par- 
ish, who are supported by alms which should be dis- 
tributed to those who are truly poor ; and these dev- 
otees it is who devotedly act as spies in the parish, 
and in the morning they come to the confessional of 
the reverend curate and make their revelations. This 
is an iniquity, I know, but it is inevitable. If a tri' 
bunal should demand any information of you before 
condemning any one, and you should declare that you 
knew nothing of the case, or if you should give infor- 
mation of a favorable nature, you would be accused of 
not doing your duty.' 

" ' But when do you fulfill the principal duties of 
your office as curate, such as preaching, instruction, 
visiting the poor and sick ?' 



THE PUSEYITE'S LETTER. 123 

'''Those duties wliicli you call essential are held 
here to be veiy secondary. 

u ^ Preaching^ for example : I know in Rome a cu- 
rate, one of the best and most highly esteemed, who has 
never preached in his life because of his incapacity. 
Others preach on certain Sundays in the year, but they 
have so small an audience that, were it not for some 
of those devotees, they would have no listeners. We 
are not free to preach the Word of God. The themes 
of our discourse, every thing that we may say, and 
which is always the same, are all marked out before- 
hand for us in the Roman Catechism. As regards the 
instruction for Sunday, the children are made to recite 
from memory for one hour from the catechism of Bel- 
larmine. 

" ' As concerns visiting the poor, the deputies of the 
commission on subsidies are intrusted with that ; and 
as for the sick, the vicar, sexton, and certain priests 
are paid for performing that duty.' 

"Mr. Pasquali until then had not opened his mouth; 
but now he rose, and, taking the hand of the curate, 
he said to him, 

" ' I advise you to meditate on the two first verses 
of the fourth chapter of the First Epistle to the Corin- 
thians : " Let a man so account of us, as of the min- 
isters of Christ, and stewards of the mysteries of God. 
Moreover, it is required in stewards that a man be found 
faithful." 

" ' Thus do the men act who are esteemed by us as 
the true ministers of Christ, and the faithful dispensers 
of the mysteries of God.' 

" After that we bade the curate farewell. I avow 



124 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

to you, my dear abbe, that our conversation with this 
curate greatly disconcerted me; but what has still 
more disgusted me with the Roman system is what I 
learned from a second conversation, which I will relate 
to you orally, if you will grant me another interview 
to continue our discussion. If Rome is really such as 
it has been depicted to me, I shall cease to admire it. 
''Believe me your humble servant, Manson." 

What can I say to this, my dear Eugene? Mr. 
Hanson's letter has also strongly shaken my faith in 
Rome. I assure you I am in a horrible position. I 
hear a voice crying within me which says, " Thou art 
in error, and the Waldensian is in the right." I know 
that this voice is that of a demon ; but I know his 
power and capacity, and he leaves me neither a day nor 
an hour in repose. I hope this temptation will pass 
away, because I feel, in the midst of this trial, that 
truth is on the side of the religion I profess. I know 
abuses exist in Rome, but these abuses proceed from 
men and not from religion ; they exist merely in prac- 
tice, and not in doctrine — the doctrine is holy and 
true. But what increases my agony is that I have no 
one to open my heart to except you ; but even you, 
alas ! what consolation can you give me ? 

I replied to Mr. Manson, thanking him for his com- 
munication, and begging him to dispense with an in- 
terview for the moment, but to please to make use of 
the post for any further communication. 

I can not sustain a discussion for the present. God 
will give me the strength later. Adieu, dear Eugene. 
Your affectionate Henry. 




A ROMAN FUNERAL. 



MORE FEOM THE PUSEYITE. 127 



NINTH LETTER. 

Eome, March, 1847. 

Deae Eugene, — Two days after the reception of 
the letter that I spoke to you about in my last, the 
post "brought me a second one from the same friend, 
of which the following is a copy : 

" Sir Abbe, — I should have liked greatly to have 
conversed with you, in the hope that you could have 
some good reasons to give me to refute the revelations 
made by the curate, but your refusal has led me to 
fear that you have nothing to oppose to them. Nev- 
ertheless, I want to inform you of what passed at a 
second interview which we had with the same eccle- 
siastic. 

*'Two days after our first interview we returned 
again to see him. He was in the sacristy. A discon- 
solate-looking lady, in a dark dress, was seated before 
a table on which the curate was writing ; the sexton 
and undertaker stood at his side, and cast glances of 
intelligence at each other, accompanied by certain re- 
pulsive smiles. Seeing the curate occupied, we remain- 
ed at a distance, when he, laying down his pen, thus 
addressed the lady, at the same time handing her a 
paper. 'This is your account, and be assured that 
we have treated you with all possible economy.' 

'"Fifty scudi!' (dollars!) cried the lady; 'where 
can a poor widow like me procure them ?' 



128 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

" But, not to enter upon the minute details of this 
affair, which deeply affected me, I will merely tell you 
that this poor lady had lost her husband the evening 
before, and had now come to bargain with the curate 
for his burial. Our friend the curate passes for one 
of the most disinterested priests of Rome. Neverthe- 
less, the sum of fifty Roman scudi was a very consid- 
erable one for a poor woman to pay down immediately, 
especially as she had lived until then on the small sal- 
ary of her husband, who left her no fortune and the 
charge of six children. 

''There the widow stood, with the account of the 
curate before her, her eyes, filled with tears, fixed on 
the paper. The sexton and the undertaker were 
stretching out their necks to find out from the account 
each one's share. They observed to the widow that 
the curate had treated her with exceeding moderation, 
but the poor woman listened to nothing that was said 
to her. 

" ' Observe,' said the undertaker, ' that, for my part, 
by this death I only get seven scudi when I ought 
to receive at least ten.' 

'"And the Church,' said the sexton, 'only takes 
about ten ; the rest is for the curate and the expenses 
of the priests and monks ; and you ought to be de- 
lighted,' he added, 'that the curate is so easy with 
you!' 

"As for us, that is, Mr. Sweetman and myself, in 
spite of our English phlegm, we could no longer con- 
tain ourselves. Mr. Pasquali took the lead on this 
occasion, and, taking the curate aside, he begged him 
to dismiss this poor lady under some pretext, and to 



MORE FROM THE PUSEYITE. 129 

tell her that he would call on her in an hour and ar- 
range this affair. After that he went out a moment, 
begging us to wait for him, and in the mean time we 
went to the curate's apartment. 

" When we were alone with him, we begged him to 
explain to us the funeral system of Rome. He con- 
sented, and said, 'A few hours after the death of a 
person, the body is brought to the church of the par- 
ish. It is on this occasion that certain taxes must be 
paid to the curate. After the funeral service has been 
performed in the church, the body is transported at 
night to the cemetery, where it is buried.' Wishing 
to know about this more in detail, he told us, ' One 
must admit that this is not the most edifying thing in 
Rome, but no matter, I will explain it to you as it is.' 
And then he informed us that in the Roman Church 
there is a code called the Clerical Statutes^ according 
to which funeral expenses are governed. The Ro- 
mans, as well as the strangers who die in Rome, are 
obliged to conform to it, and to follow it exactly in 
matters of funeral ceremonies. 

"If any, from humility or other motives, refuse to 
go to this expense, then the curate cites him before a 
tribunal, where he is immediately condemned to pay 
the price of a funeral, though not performed according 
to statute, just as if it had been, and in case there are 
many creditors of the estate, the curate is privileged 
and has priority. ' Look,' he added, ' at the case of 
this poor widow, which torments me. I know that 
she possesses nothing, and is obliged to contract a 
debt to pay me ; but what can I do ? If I dispense 
with payment from her, every body would want to be 

F 2 



130 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

exempted, and then what should I do ? My colleagues 
would accuse me of introducing abuses, and I should 
become involved in great difficulties.' 

" At this moment Mr. Pasquali returned, and begged 
the curate to accompany us in a visit to the congre- 
gations which assist the Pope in exercising his su- 
premacy, and the curate, after giving some orders to 
the sexton, started off with us. 

"He conducted us, in the first place, to the Office of 
the Secretary of Indulgences. In the first chamber 
we found a man putting the seal to permissions of in- 
dulgence ; the second room was full of pasteboard 
boxes, containing the original papers of indulgences 
already granted. Four tables were occupied by as 
many priests, three of whom were writing permissions, 
and the fourth one was distributing them on payment. 
We passed then into another room, where there was 
a little prelate, who was the substitute of the secre- 
tary. This man, being a particular friend of the cu- 
rate, received us with the greatest politenesm^ and, 
knowing we were strangers, he instructed us with the 
greatest good-humor in all the details of the office. He 
told. us that the sacred congregation of indulgences 
was composed of many cardinals, but only as a matter 
of form ; that, besides, there was a prelate entitled sec- 
retary, but who never paid any attention to the office, 
which was carried on by his substitute or assistant, 
and by the official priests. They it is who grant 
indulgences, privileged altars, the right of blessing 
crowns, medals, crucifixes, and thousands of objects, 
to those who ask for them. 

"I asked him to explain to us what he meant by 



MORE FROM THE PUSEYITE. 131 

privileged altars. He smiled at my ignorance, and- 
told me that a privileged altar is one upon which a 
mass being said a soul is immediately delivered from 
Purgatory, and the benefits of this deliverance go to 
the profit of the soul for which the mass was said. 
* Privileged altars,' he added, ^are of two sorts, the 
real and the personal. The real is where the privi- 
lege is attached to the altar itself, and the personal 
is where the privilege is attached to the person who 
says mass ; so that the priest who possesses a personal 
privileged altar delivers a soul from Purgatory every 
where he says a mass.' 

*' 'But,' said Mr. Sweetman, ' a person desirous of 
possessing this privilege must buy it.' 

" 'Buy it ? No,' replied the assistant ; ' they only 
pay a trifle ; but the possessor of it derives great ad- 
vantage fi'om it, for as soon as it is known that his 
mass delivers a soul from Purgatory, immediately ev- 
ery one tries to get one of these privileged priests to 
say their masses, and they pay them more than the 
others.' n, 

" Oh ! dear Abbe, what can you allege to justify so 
horrible an abuse ? And note that this is not only an 
abuse, but an error in doctrine the greatest imaginable. 
What ! for a few sous I could buy the right of deliver- 
ing souls from Purgatory ? This is, I think, an unpar- 
alleled iniquity But I continue my recital. 

"Mr. Pasquali asked what method was employed 
in the sale of indulgences. The assistant replied, 
' If a petitioner demands one for himself or family, it 
is granted without difficulty ; but those which appear 
to be of a public character I refer to his Holiness. For 



132 KOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

those granted in perpetuity, and which bring great 
profits to the Church or to the person to whom they 
are granted, the secretary makes out the rescript, and 
sends it to the office of Secretary of Briefs, where a 
consideralble sum is paid, according to the quality of 
the privilege. 

"Mr. Pasquali remarked that, indulgences being 
things purely spiritual, it appeared to him that to sell 
them was simony. 

" ' Certainly,' replied the assistant, ' if indulgences 
were sold it would be simony ; God forbid our having 
such a thought I It is unjust that Protestants should 
accuse the holy Church of making money out of every 
thing. In the first place, indulgences are not sold, but 
granted gratuitously. What we oblige them to pay 
for is not the indulgence, but the stamp, the ink, the 

paper, etc and as these are material things that 

we are obliged to buy, so, in good conscience, we may 
sell them.' 

'' After this we left the assistant, and, thanking him 
for his kindness, we walked on toward the office of an- 
other secretary. 

" On the way the curate informed us that the con- 
gregation of the indulgences was united to that of rel- 
ics, and he invited us to visit the depot or custodia of 
relics. 

"We went, therefore, to the old German College, 
now the Roman Seminary, where the custodia is to be 
found. The first chamber is ornamented with sepul- 
chral stones, with glasses and antique vases, with lamps 
called eternal lights, and other things of a similar char- 
acter. The second room is full of wooden boxes, paint- 



MORE PROM THE PUSEYITE. 133 

ed green, which contain the relics of common saints. 
In this chamber we found four priests occupied in ar- 
ranging relics in little cases ready for distribution ; 
and on the tables you behold, in a confusion that makes 
you shudder, bones, teeth, bits of old clothes, hair, and 
other articles, spread out so indelicately that I could 
not believe that these were real relics. I concluded, 
too, that the priests who distributed them did not much 
believe in them, otherwise they would have handled 
them with less disgust. The third chamber is des- 
tined for relics called incomparable. The relics of the 
apostles, the Virgin, and our Lord, are preserved in 
this room, and here the guardian priest who occupies 
it holds audiences. This priest, being a friend of the 
curate, received him .with the utmost politeness. 

^' ' My friends,' said the curate, presenting us, ' de- 
sire to see some of the incomparable relics.' 

" ' It is impossible,' replied the official ; ' I can not 
show them without a written permission from the vice- 
cardinal. But tell me, Mr. Curate, are these gentlemen 
Catholics?' 

" When ho was told who we were, he appeared as if 
thunderstruck. 

" ' Quick ! quick ! Mr. Curate, let us be gone from 
here!' and he conducted us outside the custodia ; but 
when we were in the corridor he begged our pardon, 
and told us that if the vice-cardinal should know that 
three Protestants had entered the custodia he would 
unquestionably lose his place. 

" We inquired the reason for so much caution. 

" ' Because Protestants come to examine every 
thing; then they publish what they have seen, and 
cast discredit upon us in foreign countries.' 



134 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

'' ' Come, Mr. Canon,' said the curate, 'you are too 
severe ; you know me too well to suppose that I would 
get you into trouble.' 

" 'Very wellj' said the canon ; 'I will give you some 
hints, but I can not show you any thing.' 

''We were therefore obliged to content ourselves 
with this. 

" He then told us that, as it regarded ordinary rel- 
ics, they possessed a great quantity of them, for new 
saints were discovered every day in the catacombs ; 
but as regards the more remarkable relics there were 
but a few. 

''I inquired how the Pope managed to decide upon 
a skeleton found in the catacombs as being that of a 
saint. 

" ' The Pope,' he replied, ' cares little about such 
things ; he has confided this business to the vicar-car- 
dinal, who, in turn, leaves it to Father Marchi, a Jesu- 
it, who visits the bodies that are disinterred, and sends 
them here when he thinks they belonged to saints. 
Here we baptize them, and distribute them to the faith- 
ful.' 

*' 'You baptize them!' said I, interrupting him in 
my astonishment ; " you baptize dead bodies !' 

'' The canon explained then that to baptize meant 
to give them a name. 

" * We do not know what these corpses are. Well, 
the custodia needs relics of Saint Patrick, for instance, 
so this body is named Saint Patrick.^ 

''Mr. Pasquali observed that the authenticity thus 
depended upon the judgment of a single individual, 
and this man a Jesuit. 



MOEE FROM THE PUSEYITE. 137 

"The official shrugged his shoulders and contin- 
ued: 

" ' As for the more notable relics, we have but few 
of -them. We have some of the twelve apostles, and 
of John the Baptist ; some milk, some hair, and some 
clothes of the Virgin, of Saint Joseph, Saint James, 
and Saint Anna. Besides these, we have a few relics 
of our Lord, that is to say, two thorns from his crown, 
a piece of the true cross, a piece of the inscription, an- 
other, of the sponge, one of his seamless coat, a piece 
of the reed, etc., etc., etc. But if you really want to 
see superior relics, you will find them in the Church 
of the Holy Gross^ where you will see the finger of 
Saint Thomas with which he touched the side of our 
Lord ; a vial full of the blood of Jesus Christ ; anoth- 
er vial full of the milk of the holy Virgin ; the stone 
upon which Saint Gabriel stood at the annunciation 
of the blessed Virgin ; a piece of the stone on which 
our Savior sat when he forgave the sins of Mary Mag- 
dalene ; a piece of the two tables of the law written by 
the hand of God ; a very little of the manna with which 
God fed his people in the desert ; the entire inscrip- 
tion of the cross ; a large portion of the cross itself; a 
lock of Christ's hair, and many other relics not less 
precious. 

" 'In the Church of Santa Cecilia you will find 
some more of the Virgin's milk, and more still in the 
Church of San Cosmo ^ and still more in Santa Maria 
delta Traspontina. 

" ' In the Church of St. Prassede you will find an 
under-garment of the Virgin; a piece of the rod of Mo- 
ses, and the portrait of our Lord Jesus Christ, which 



138 ROME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

Saint Peter gave to Pudentius ; one of the stones used 
in stoning Stephen, and the column to which our Lord 
was bound and scourged. 

"'At St. John Lateran there is preserved the 
blood and water which ran out from the side of Jesus 
Christ ; the head of Saint Zacharias, father of John 
the Baptist ; the towel upon which Jesus wiped his 
hands after washing the feet of the apostles ; the table 
used at the last Supper ; the rods of Moses and Aaron; 
the altar used by John the Baptist in the desert. I 
pass by a great many other important relics to be found 
in the other churches of Rome.' ^ 

"By this time Mr. Sweetman's countenance was 
crimson with indignation, and he could no longer con- 
tain himself; I partook of the same emotion ; but Mr. 
Pasquali, perfectly cool and apparently unconcerned, 
continued to question the good canon, until the curate, 
foreseeing unpleasant consequences, bade him farewell, 
and we left. 

" Mr. Pasquali then asked the curate on what pas- 
sage of the Bible the Roman Church founded the wor- 
ship of relics ? 

" ' On two incidents,' replied the curate; 'the for- 
mer of which is the scene described in the book of Rev- 
elation as occurring in heaven itself, where the reve- 
lator says, " I saw under the altar the souls of them 
that were slain for the Word of God." If, therefore, 
the souls of martyrs are under the altar in heaven, their 

^ Note hy Translator, — Some of the most venerated of these relics 
are exhibited in the Church of Saint Peter during the Holy Week, 
among which are two nails of the cross, the spear which pierced 
Christ's side, and the handkerchief of Saint Veronica. 



I 



MOEE FEOM THE PUSEYITE. 139 

bodies can very well be kept on our altars on earth. 
The other fact is related, concerning Stephen, in Acts, 
viii., 2: ''And devout men carried Stephen to his 
burial." Hence we see that to collect and preserve the 
relics of saints is a religious work.' 

" What do you think of such arguments, Mr. Abbe? 
Do you know of any better ones to sustain the practice ? 

"The curate having taken his leave, we asked Mr. 
Pasquali whither he had gone when he left us so sud- 
denly in the sacristy. Our good friend told us that he 
had gone to console the poor widow, and had sent her 
a check for fifty scudi to pay for the funeral expenses 
of her husband. We insisted that he should allow us 
to take our share in this charitable act. 

" In the evening we went to witness the manner of 
burying the dead in Rome. What a horrible sight ! 

" The first hour after midnight the corpses destined 
for burial are carried out from each parish church, borne 
by two men, preceded by a mercenary priest, who not 
unfrequently leaves the dead body in the street as he 
stops with his two companions at some tavern on the 
way to take a drink. 

"Having reached the place where the corpses are 
temporarily deposited, they pile them one upon anoth- 
er, until each parish has forwarded those they have to 
send. 

" During this interval, the men sit upon the corpses, 
making use of the most indecent language, cursing, 
swearing, and using insulting expressions toward the 
dead bodies. . . .^ 

^ The wTiter was an eye-witness to these facts, and could mention 
places as well as persons. It is true that now things are not carried 



140 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

"All the bodies being at length collected, they are 
thrown together on a wagon, and transported to the 
cemetery. There ffhe corpses are precipitated into a 
deep pit of masonry ; the aperture is closed with a 
huge stone, to be opened again the next day on the ar- 
rival of other bodies. 

" This system of burial, as barbarous as it is im- 
pious, roused my indignation. Mr. Sweetman desired 
to leave Rome immediately, but Mr. Pasquali per- 
suaded him to remain. 

" I feel that my inclination for the Eoman Church 
is growing more feeble from day to day, and I know 
not how it will end. In the name of charity, grant me 
an interview, I desire so much to converse with you 
about all these things. 

" Believe me your affectionate friend, 

"W. Manson, M.A." 

on in an exactly similar manner, because, in 1849, the system of the 
transportation of corpses was somewhat ameliorated.^ 

^ The translator of these letters, while in Kome in the winter of 
1852-53, visited the Campo Santo of a church at one of the entrances 
of the Catacombs, where men were engaged in clearing out those ter- 
rible burial-pits, which were about fifteen feet in depth, and number- 
ed perhaps fifty. There had been thrown together, in horrible con- 
fusion, the bodies of soldiers killed during the Revolution, together 
with those of women and children, mostly without cofiins, but some- 
times a few rough boards, bound by a cord, preserved the rotting 
skeletons from falling in pieces as the workmen drew them up to 
the pavement. On looking down upon this mass of corruption, from 
which a pestilential stench arose, there could be seen here and there 
among the bones a part of a soldier's coat or buttons, clotted hair, or 
perhaps a woman's shoe still hanging to the bones of the feet. As 
soon as the authorities discovered us, we were ordered from the place. 
The massive doors of the inclosure were shut upon us, and we stood 



EFFECT OF THE LETTER. 141 

P.S. — My dear Eugene, I am utterly bewildered; 
after transcribing this letter I can not add a single 
word. Pardon my confusion ; pity your poor friend. 

Henry. 

without in the beautiful Campagna, leaving the Roman buriers to 
their horrible work* 



142 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL, 



TENTH LETTEE. 

Rome, March, 1847. 

My DEAR Eugene, — The second letter from Mr. 
Manson troubled me exceedingly. I have lived in 
Rome several years, but I never knew of these things. 
The infernal revelations uttered by those imprudent 
priests show but too well that many abuses exist in 
the administration of ecclesiastical affairs in Rome, and 
that a reform is necessary. 

Discouraged, overcome, and oppressed with sad 
thoughts, I sought in complete solitude an alleviation 
for the depression of my mind. 

One day, after dinner, I took refuge under the arches 
of the amphitheatre of Vespasian, and there, seated on 
the ruins in the most solitary place, I remained ab- 
sorbed in thought, when suddenly the sound of per- 
sons approaching drew me from my reflections, and 
my three friends appeared. They seemed greatly de- 
lighted on perceiving me. After a few courteous re- 
marks, the Waldensian said, with his accustomed grav- 
ity, that he could not explain my conduct in thus aban- 
doning the discussion. 

" Either you think you are right," said he, '' and in 
that case, then, you ought not to yield the ground; 
or you acknowledge yourself in the wrong, and then 
you should not remain there ; or else you are in doubt, 
and if so, you ought to become assured of the truth, 
and to follow it after having found it." 



DISCUSSION RESUMED. 14o 

I replied that I was sure the truth was on my 
side, but that it was impossible to reply to arguments 
taken from the Bible if the authority of the Church was 
denied. 

" Very well," he replied, " I will agree to admit the 
authority of your Church in our discussion. Are you 
content ?" 

I begged him to explain himself more clearly ; then 
he added, 

"I do not admit the authority of the BoTnan Churchy 
which I could not do without the sacrifice of common 
sense ; but, to convince you more thoroughly in our 
discussion, I will place myself on your ground, and we 
will examine the subject from the interpretation of 
those very fathers who interpreted it precisely as was 
ordered by the Council of Trent at the fourth session." 

Mr. Manson thereupon remarked to the Waldensian 
that neither did he admit entirely the authority of the 
Roman Church, but he did not perceive how the ad- 
mitting of it should necessarily imply the relinquish- 
ing of common sense ! 

" This was not our principal question," replied Mr. 
Pasquali; "I will confine myself to the statement 
that, to accept of the infallible authority of the Roman 
Church, one must admit four or five contradictions, 
every one of which seems, if possible, more glaring 
than the rest. For instance, you must acknowledge 
the Bible to be obscure and unintelligible in matters 
which are clearer than the light of noonday, as, for ex- 
ample, with regard to salvation hy grace. 

"Again, you must regard the Scriptures as clear 
and evident in regard to the most obscure points, even 



144 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

in those that are not mentioned at all ; as, for instance, 
respecting the infallibility of the Church. 

"You must allow that a collection of fallible men 
constitute an infallible authority ; you must, in spite 
of reason, acknowledge that a man, by nature subject 
to error, as soon as raised to the office of Pope, either 
by intrigue or by money, becomes infallible ; that the 
decisions of the councils, although in conflict with each 
other, are infallible ; that, when one Pope infallibly 
overthrows what another Pope had infallibly estab- 
lished, both are infallible. Are not these things con- 
trary to common sense ? Add to all this that while 
this Roman Church sustains dogmatically that the in- 
terpretation of the Bible does not belong to individuals, 
yet there exists in this very Church such an immense 
number of interpreters that, by collecting all their 
works, one could form the most immense library, and 
the absurdities, impertinences, and blasphemies that 
they contain are so numerous that, when collected, it 
would be found that all the false interpretations at- 
tributed to the heretics are far from equaling those of 
the interpreters of the Roman Church. 

*' Saint Jerome^ for instance, in his apology address- 
ed to Pammachus, presumes to accuse Saint Paul of 
trickery and dissimulation. 

"You, Mr. Abbe," he added, "have too much good 
sense to accept these things as a whole ; but this is 
not the object of our discussion for to-day. I would 
like, if agreeable to you, to continue our discussion on 
the Primacy." 

As for me, not feeling sufficiently prepared to reply 
to the objections of the Waldensian respecting the au- 



PRIMACY OF THE POPE. 145 

thority of the Church, and especially as many of them 
demanded a profound knowledge of history, I was con- 
tent to speak on the question of the primacy. We 
were in a solitary place, and there was no one to trouble 
us ; we sat down, therefore, upon a prostrate column, 
and recommenced our discussion. 

You recollect, doubtless, that our last conversation 
related to the celebrated passage of Saint Matthew, 
"Thou art Peter," etc., etc. 

*'Do not believe," said I, ''that I admit myself 
vanquished by the explanations you famished on our 
last debate. You insisted on interpreting this sen- 
tence, and on this stone^ so as to establish that the 
stone was not Peter, but Jesus Christ. Be it so. But 
what reply can you make to the words which follow ? 
'/ xoill give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of 
heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt hind on earth 
shall he hound in heaven^ and whatsoever thou shalt 
loose on earth shall he loosed in heaven."* It is beyond 
doubt that here Jesus gives a power to Peter, known 
by the name of the power of the keys, that is to say, 
the right to govern his Church, the power to remit sins, 
to bind souls by censure, to transmit, legitimately, 
this right to others, to interpret the Scriptures, to or- 
dain ministers, and, in a word, over every thing which 
constitutes the administration of the Church. The 
symbol of the keys is the symbol of the most absolute 
and unlimited authority. Saint Peter, therefore, in 
receiving the promise of the keys of the kingdom of 
heaven, was promised the most absolute and unlim- 
ited power." 

" You yourself, Mr. Abbe," replied the Waldensian, 

G 



146 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

''have, without being aware of it, furnished me with 
the best reply. The keys, you say, are a sign of pow- 
er. Now let us examine if the holy text determines 
this power expressed by the emblem of the keys, and 
if it was intrusted to Peter only. 

" ' Whatsoever thou shalt hind on earth shall be 
hound in heaven^ and whatsoever thou shalt loose on 
earth shall he loosed in heaven.'' 

" Thus Jesus himself determines the extent of the 
symbolical power of the keys. Now this power was 
not promised to Peter alone, but to all Christians ; not 
merely to priests and bishops, but to every true Chris- 
tian, whether priest or layman." 

This extravagant idea of the Waldensian brought a 
smile to my lips, as well as to those of Mr. Manson ; 
but Pasquali, taking a Bible from his pocket, said, 

" I advance nothing without good reason. Read, I 
beg of you, the 18th verse of the 18th chapter of Saint 
Matthew." 

Then he remarked that, although a traditional inter- 
pretation pretended that the words of the 18th verse 
were addressed to the apostles alone, like the 21st, 
22d, and 23d verses of the 20th chapter of John, yet 
the truth is that they were not addressed to the apos- 
tles only, but to the disciples. 

" 'These words,' says the Council of Trent, 'con- 
tained a promise which was realized in the 20th chapter 
of John, verse 23, when Jesus really gave what he had 
promised, that is to say, the faculty of remitting or re- 
taining sins.' 

" If, therefore," continued Mr. Pasquali, " you study 
well the Gospel, by comparing the 20th of John with 



PRIMACY OF THE POPE. 147 

the 24th of Luke, you will see that Jesus gave to the 
disciples the power of remitting sins on the evening 
^ preceding the day of his resurrection, when the two dis- 
ciples, returning from Emmaus, found together the elev- 
en and those that were with them. The power of the 
keys was not, therefore, given exclusively to Peter, as 
is pretended Tby the Church of Rome ; not to the apos- 
tles alone, as the commentators would have it ; but 
to all the disciples. This power, therefore, not only 
does not establish the primacy of Peter, but excludes 
it." 

" But what becomes, then, of the apostolic succes- 
sion?" said Mr.Manson. 

" It becomes," said the Waldensian, " what it ought 
to become. The apostles, as such, can not have had 
successors ; as disciples, they have had for successors 
all Christians who profess the same faith with them- 
selves." 

" And the power of the Church transmitted by suc- 
cession ?" continued Mr. Manson. 

'' In the Bible there is not a word which establish- 
es this transmission," replied the Waldensian; "the 
power of the Church has its foundation in its only head, 
Jesus Christ. The Church is the body of Christ. 
Christians or disciples are members of this body of 
which Christ is the head. From this there results that 
the authority of the Church is none other than that of 
Christ, communicated by Him to His body in so far 
as He is united to this body as its head." 

"According to your idea, then," I added, "every 
Christian would possess the power of the keys ; there 
would no longer exist any distinction between bish- 



148 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

ops, priests, or laymen. Every one would have the 
power to remit sins, and the Church would no longer 
be a well-organized society, but a horrible anarchy!" 

Mr. Manson was not alone in supporting my opin- 
ion ; Mr. Sweetman also agreed with me. But the 
Waldensian, having remarked that our discussion had 
led us away from our theme — the primacy of the Pope 
— begged us to bear our objection in mind, and bring 
it up again when we discussed the nature of the 
Church. He would have replied to lis immediately 
if his reply would not necessarily have engaged us in 
a long discussion. 

I remarked that he had not kept his promise to dis- 
cuss according to the principles of the Roman Church. 
Then taking from his pocket a memorandum on which 
some passages from the fathers were written, 

''Very well," said he; "here I am ready to keep 
my word. The Council of Trent commands that the 
Bible should be interpreted after the unanimous con- 
sent of the fathers. Let us now interpret this pas- 
sage: 'I will give unto thee the keys^^ etc., according 
to the interpretation of the fathers. 

''In the first place, Origen speaks thus : 'Is it pos- 
sible that the keys of the kingdom of heaven were 
given by our Lord to Peter only, and that none of the 
other elect could receive them?' 

"If the words, ^I will give unto thee the heys^'' etc., 
be common to the other apostles, why should they 
not be so understood, like the passages that precede 
and follow them, though seemingly addressed to Peter 
alone ? 

^ Homil. xii., in Matt., No. 11. 



PRIMACY OF THE POPE. 149 

"You see that Origen believed with me that the 
power of the keys was given hj Jesus to all the dis- 
ciples and elect, that is to say, to all Christians, and 
not to Peter alone, nor to the apostles. 

'' Jerome^ says, ' You say that the Church is found- 
ed on Peter ; but we read that it is founded equally 
on all the apostles, and that each of them has received 
the keys of the kingdom of heaven.' 

''Ambrose^ assures us that what was said to Peter 
was also said to the other apostles : 'T will give thee 
the keys of the kingdom of heaven.'' 

" Gaudentius^ aflSrms that all the apostles, after the 
resurrection of Christ, received, as well as Peter, the 
keys of the kingdom of heaven^ when the Lord said to 
them, ^Receive ye the Holy Ghost'' 

^^ Augustine^ declares that the keys of the king- 
dom of heaven were given to the Church when they 
were given to Peter ; and in another passage,^ ' Can 
it be said that these keys were received by Peter and 
Paul only? No. Did not Peter, James, and John, 
and the other apostles, receive them ? Are not these 
the keys given to that Church in which sins are remit- 
ted daily? These keys were not given to one man 
alone, but to the imity of the Church.' " 

Not to be tedious, my dear Eugene, I will tell you 
that the Waldensian cited many other passages taken 
from the fathers, all of the same period — passages of 
which I took a copy, in order to reply to them ; but, 
after having made all these quotations, putting his 

^ Advers. lorim., lib. i. ^ In Psalm xxxviii. 

^ Orat. Ixvi., in die suae rdu. * De Aug. Chr., cap. 30. 

^ Sermon 149, de verbis Domini ; et Serm. 295, in nat. Apost. 



150 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

memorandum in his pocket, he turned toward me and 
said, 

" What do you think of these, Mr. Abbe ? Either 
your fathers are heretics like me, or I am a Catholic 
like them: make your choice." 

Then, addressing Mr. Manson, he said, 

''Ecclesiastical antiquity must be studied at its 
source, and not in books written by those who seek in 
this antiquity merely a support for their errors." 

Tou may well believe that I did not' allow this ar- 
gument, drawn from the fathers, to pass without a re- 
ply, and I told him that I could produce, on my side, 
at least as many passages from the fathers which ab- 
solutely contradicted these, and which proved the su- 
premacy of the Pope by these very words, "I will 
give unto thee the keys," etc. 

But Mr. Pasquali, in a serious tone of voice, isaid to 
me, 

" That is just what I expected, Mr. Abbe. Since 
the unanimous consent of your fathers sustains both 
the jpro and the con of a doctrine, and interprets the 
Bible in two senses entirely opposite, you ought to 
confess that the principle of interpretation, as laid 
down by the Council of Trent, is false and delusive 
— -false^ because by it you never can obtain a verita- 
ble interpretation ; delusive^ because, when you think 
to have obtained a certain principle of interpreta- 
tion, you are obliged to have recourse to another, that 
is to say, to the Church, and to renounce every other 
interpretation whatsoever. Let us return, therefore, 
purely and simply to the only certain source, to the 
pure Word of God, and disregard this antiquity which 



THE CURATE OF SANTA MARIA. 161 

contradicts itself, which can only serve the purpose of 
displaying its erudition, but never answer the end of 
. doctrinal demonstration." 

By this time night had come on. Being invited to 
pass the evening at Monsignior C.'s, I was about to 
take leave of my friends, when they told me that they 
also were invited there, so we went together. 

On the way, I asked Mr. Manson who the curate 
was of whom he had spoken to me in his two letters. 

'' It was," said he, '' the curate of Santa Maria Mad- 
dalena, a man of considerable learning, who has been 
Professor of Theology, and is still Emeritus Censor of 
the Theological Academy of Rome, and Theologian of 
the Holy Office; but he appears," he added, *'not to 
be over-pleased with the Eoman Church." 

I expressed the desire to know him, and my friends 
appointed the next morning for that purpose. 

What I saw during the miserable evening that I 
spent at Monsignior C.'s, and what I learned the next 
morning, contributed much more than all my discus- 
sions \yith the Waldensian to dishearten and disturb 
me. But I have reached the end of my sheet, and 
in my next I will relate every thing. Adieu. 

Henry. 



a 



i 




CARDINAL IN PRIVATE HABIT. 



THE SOIREE. ^ 155 



ELEVENTH LETTER. 

Rome, March, 1847. 

My dear Eugene, — ^I promised in my last to relate 
to you what passed at the soiree I attended with my 
friends at Monsignior C.'s. Although it is with great 
reluctance that I give you an account of things that 
will in no wise edify you, yet I prefer to open my heart 
to you in all sincerity, rather than, from personal con- 
siderations, to hide the least thing from you. I am a 
Catholic, and a sincere Catholic ; and although the ar- 
guments of Mr. Pasquali, the revelations of the curate, 
and the disorders that I witness trouble me sometimes, 
yet I remain attached to my Church. I believe it to 
be the true Church, although I recognize that it is 
somewhat fallen from the original purity of its doctrine, 
and somewhat disgraced by abuses that have crept in. 
These abuses are the work of man, but the doctrine 
proceeds from God. 

We went, therefore, together to the palace of Mon- 
signior C. The staircase was magnificently lighted 
with candles ; a number of domestics, in rich livery, 
announced, with a loud voice, the new-comers in the 
antechambers. Their names were then repeated from 
room to room, so as to arrive at the one where the 
prelate stood long before those who were announced 
could reach him, so that he might, according to eti- 
quette, advance more or less to meet them, as their 
rank demanded. Thus we traversed four apartments 



156 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

on our way to the reception-room. This last was of 
very large dimensions, furnished magnificently, and 
brilliantly lighted. The prelate came forward a step 
or two to meet us, shook hands cordially with the two 
Englishmen, and nodded slightly to the Waldensian 
and to me. Then he presented the former to certain 
cardinals, prelates, priests, and lords who were present. 
As for myself, being only a poor little Abbe, I remained 
with Mr. Pasquali in the corner of the saloon, and, I 
assure you, I was extremely mortified. AH this time 
the guests continued to arrive, and, after the first sal- 
utations, they separated into dificrent groups and en- 
gaged in conversation. The ladies were seated on 
sofas, leaning against rich damask cushions, and were 
entertained by divers prelates, cardinals, and priests 
who stood near them. 

Mr. Pasquali then observed to me, 

" Mr. Abb^, what do you think of your successors of 
the apostles ? Do you see any resemblance between 
the house of this prelate and that of Saint Peter, which 
Christ entered to heal his mother-in-law ?" 

I bit my lips without replying. 
^ In a group near to us there stood a lady and two 
prelates, and, from their laughter and gestures, it was 
easy to perceive that their conversation related to sub- 
jects of a nature not the most becoming. 

The Waldensian proposed that we should draw near 
to some other group. The most edifying discourse 
that we heard was from three old prelates who were 
talking politics. 

Soon after, the doors of another brilliant saloon were 
opened. Each of the cardinals, prelates, or priests 



THE SOIEEE. 157 

eagerly offered his arm to one of the ladies to conduct 
them into this saloon, where a superb table was cover- 
ed with the most delicate dishes ; fishes of all species, 
prepared with the most exquisite luxury, preserves and 
fruits of all sorts, covered the table, around which the 
ladies only were seated, while the prelates stood behind 
them to attend to their wants. Dear Eugene, this sight 
was repugnant to me ; we were in Lent, and it was a 
day of fasting. It is true, there was no meat at the 
table, but the excessive display shocked me, as it did 
also the two Englishmen, who drew up toward us. I 
would fain have left the place, but Mr. Pasquali detain- 
ed me. 

'' I have come to Rome," said he, " to acquaint Mr. 
Sweetman with its character ; and although such a 
sight is repugnant to my feelings, yet I desire to see 
the end of it, so that Mr. Sweetman may be able to 
say, when he returns to England, what the priests, suc- 
cessors of the apostles, conversed about." 

He requested us, therefore, to keep silence, and to 
observe what was passing. The ladies were less nu- 
merous than the men, so that many priests and laymen 
were without partners, and it appeared to me that these 
were more alive to the good living before them than to 
the duties of gallantry. Also, without thinking of the 
fast of Lent, they ate like gluttons, and bottles of Cham- 
pagne disappeared before them. Two young prelates 
were paying court to the Princess S. One of them 
having received some expression of favor, the other was 
transported with indignation ; his eyes flashed with 
rage, menacing words were exchanged, and the one who 
thought himself slighted, having in his hand a knife 



158 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

with whicli he was helping the princess, struck his ri- 
val, and wounded him severely in the thigh. The 
princess screamed, and, springing up, the whole assem- 
Ibly were in commotion. I know not how the thing 
would have ended if Monsignior C and other cardi- 
nals had not interposed between the combatants. The 
wounded prelate was carried off, and Cardinal P., a 
man of great reputation, spoke, and begged the guests 
to maintain the most profound silence on this occur- 
rence, out of respect to his eminence.^ 

After this incident we returned to the former saloon, 
which, in the mean while, had undergone a transforma- 
tion. Gaming-tables were placed at the different cor- 
ners of the room, at which the ladies and cardinals were 
first invited to be seated and to begin the game. To 
us strangers it was a scandalous sight to see cardinals 
and ladies seated together, and playing at cards. But 
I assure you, my dear Eugene, that card-playing is the 
most innocent amusement to which the priests are ad- 
dicted. 

Mr. Manson was really suffering, and Mr. Sweetman 
could not believe his eyes. As for me, I was profound- 
ly humiliated ; but Mr. Pasquali, with his ordinary 
calmness, said to Mr. Manson, 

" What do you think of your brethren, the Eoman 
priests ?" 

And then, turning toward Mr. Sweetman, he said to 

him, 

^ This incident respecting two prelates, one of whom, in a fit of 
jealousy, wounded the other in the thigh with a knife at a party, was 
an actual occurrence in Rome in 1845, and the author of these letters 
could name the house where this scene occurred, and the persons 
who were engaged in it. 



THE SOIEEE. 169 

"You are astonished at these things, "but you will 
see still worse ones." 

And to me he added, 

"Mr. Abbe, defend your Church now. These are 
your champions, the successors of the apostles." 

It was indeed to me a place of torment. We had 
already been seated some time in a corner of the room, 
aloof from the rest of the company, when Monsignior 
C. approached us. We stood up as he drew near, and 
he, addressing Mr. Manson, demanded what was the 
English custom as regards parties. Mr. Manson re- 
plied that, when these parties were given by an eccle- 
siastic, and especially when numbers of them were as- 
sembled together, they were very little like his ; that, 
after having taken tea, the guests engaged in conver- 
sation, which generally related to religious subjects ; 
that then a chapter was read from the Bible, where- 
upon edifying observations were made, and the whole 
was ended by a prayer. 

"That is the great mistake of the Protestants," re- 
joined the prelate ; " always the Bible, always the Bi- 
ble; that is what makes them so obstinate in their 
errors." 

To what degree the two Englishmen were scandal- 
ized by this observation I could not weU tell you. 

Then the Waldensian said, 

" Pray will you tell me, Monsignior, if all the eccle- 
siastical parties in Eome are like this one ?" 

" Certainly not," replied the prelate; " this is an ex- 
traordinary party." 

"But card-playing," added Mr. Sweetman, "does 
your eminence think that to be a good thing ?" 



160 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

''At least there is no harm in it ; it is an innocent 
game, and it is better to play at cards than to talk 
scandal. The best priests in Rome pass all their 
evenings at this game." 

So saying, Monsignior turned around and approach- 
ed a table where a question of the game was being dis- 
cussed, and which was submitted to his arbitration. 
The whole evening was to me one of uninterrupted ag- 
ony. At length, to escape the observation of the Wal- 
densian, I left these gentlemen and went home alone. 

This was the first time I had ever been in such so-* 
ciety, and I made up my mind that it should be the 
last. Nevertheless, I am convinced that such disor- 
der should be imputed to men and not to religion. 

However, to see the first dignitaries of the Church 
pass their evenings in this manner, and then the next 
morning, after a night of debauchery, take their seats 
in the confessional to reprimand those who come to 
confess sins infinitely less disgraceful than those they 
have committed themselves — all this troubled me, and 
inspired thoughts that I would fain have cast aside. 
These reflections preoccupied me the whole night, 
which I passed without sleep. And do you know 
what thought was predominant in my mind ? It was 
the comparison between the conduct of the Waldensian 
and that of the prelate. How, thought I, this Wal- 
densian, who always speaks from the Bible, and whose 
acts are in such harmony with the Gospel, will be 
damned as a heretic and worthy of our execration, while 
these prelates, whose least innocent amusement is play- 
ing at cards, could be the true Christians and success- 
ors of the apostles, was more than I could comprehend. 



ACCOUNT OF SOULS. 161 

To drive these meditations from my mind, I re- 
solved the next morning to visit the curate, of whom 
, I have already spoken to you. Who knows, thought 
I, but this man may have some good explanation to 
give me? At any rate, I wanted to make his ac- 
quaintance. I went, therefore, the next morning to 
see this curate. I was introduced into his room, where 
I found him with my three friends and two other per- 
sons, who, as I learned later, were the sexton and the 
grave-digger. The curate was seated at a table with 
these two men, and, being occupied, he made me a sign 
to wait. Soon after having dismissed them, Mr. Pas- 
quali questioned him about what occupied him so 
much. 

"What!" said he, ''do you not know that Pass- 
over is approaching, and that I am occupied in making 
out the account of souls f 

"What is this account of souls?" said Mr. Man- 
son. 

"It is," replied the curate, "the most troublesome, 
and, at the same time, the most interesting feature of 
the care of souls." 

My friends desiring to possess a complete knowl- 
edge of this affair, the curate showed them a great 
book on the state of souls, and told us that in Rome, 
as well as in the other Roman States, the curates, dur- 
ing Lent, are obliged to visit every house, to register 
every body, whether subjects or strangers, and to make 
of these registers two copies — one for the police, the 
other for the ecclesiastical board, and to keep the 
original among their own records. 

I remarked that this was done so as to know those 



162 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

who satisfied the command concerning communion at 
Passover.^ The curate smiled, and, turning toward 
Mr. Pasquali, he said, 

" As the Abbe is a friend of yours, I presume that he 
is one ofus^ and as I have no secrets to keep from you, 
I must say that, although the pretext is that which he 

' Note hy the Translator, — Catholics are obliged to confess and 
partake of the Sacrament at least once a year, and this during the 
feast of the Passover. In Rome, and perhaps elsewhere on this oc- 
casion, a printed bulletin is given to the communicant, stating that 
he has complied with this command, and this is afterward collected 
from every person at their homes by a priest appointed for that pur- 
pose. In 1851, the government being still weak from the effects of the 
Revolution, the priests thinking it impolitic to expose their weak- 
ness, decided to distribute these tickets without obliging persons to 
observe the ordinary regulation. 

The following is an exact copy of one of these tickets in my pos- 
session, given to me while in Rome by a Roman lady of distinc- 
tion ; 



^ <3. <^ ^ <^ O <^^ <^ <<^> ^ <^> O <S> 0| 



V Tctm^cwn Leone s i^^ne^m ^jiirci^rCt^S cUrMco me/nscv 

(p VascAcdrt 'RasMAM-dionis. 

\ AnrnDomini MDCCtU 

^ fBTRO SERAJTER TAmHO. ^ 







The quotation may be translated thus : " Like lions breathing out 
fire, let us retire [i. e., after partaking of the sacrament] from that 
table, being made terrible to the devil." 



ACCOUNT OF SOULS. 163 

has stated, yet the truth is far otherwise. When we 
reply to Protestants who accuse us of so many things, 
then we put forward all these pretexts ; but among 
friends one must tell the truth. Observe, then," he 
continued, " what we are obliged to register about each 
individual, and judge for yourselves. We must, 1st. 
Note exactly his residence, the street, the number, and 
the story he occupies ; 2d. His name, family and bap- 
tismal, and place of birth ; 3d. His rank, whether no- 
ble or not, tradesman, student, workman, etc. ; 4th. 
Whether married, bachelor, or widower, etc. ; 5th. If 
a stranger, we must indicate how long a resident in 
Rome, and how long he has lived in the parish ; 6th. 
Where he lived before coming here ; 7th. What sacra- 
ments he has received ; and, if that is not sufficient, 
observe that there is a considerable blank place left to 
write down other observations." 

"And, as regards Protestants, what is your rule?" 
asked Mr. Pasquali. 

" The same as for the others," replied the curate, 
"except that we indicate them specially as Protest- 
ants. Besides, every year, we must denounce to the 
Ecclesiastical Board and to the police all the Protest- 
ants living within our parish. 

"You understand from this that all these details 
have nothing to do with the precept which obliges ev- 
ery one to partake of the communion at the feast of the 
Passover." 

" So the curates of Rome," said the Waldensian, 
' ' are police agents. " 

"Do not degrade us to that point," replied the cu- 
rate ; " say rather that we are the directors of the po- 



164 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

lice. The police depends entirely upon us ; and, to 
prove this to you, just look for yourselves." 

Saying this, he took from a drawer a package of let- 
ters from the police, asking him for information con- 
cerning different persons. 

'' So that neither the police nor the vicar dare to im- 
prison any one before having consulted us, except in ex- 
traordinary cases, and such as are perfectly palpable." 

"Then I was mistaken," said Mr. Pasquali, "in 
calling J Qiw. police agents ; I should have said spies.'''* 

The curate appeared w^ounded by this pointed re- 
mark, and rising, he invited us to follow him and con- 
tinue our visit to the office of the secretaryship.* 

"I suppose," said he, "that Monsieur I'Abbe has 
come to accompany us ?" 

I replied that, although this was not precisely the 
object of my visit, I would accompany my friends with 
pleasure. We went, therefore, to the office of tlie Sec- 
retary of the Congregation of the Council. 

" This chancery whither I am conducting you," said 
the curate, on the way, "belongs to the Congregation 
of the Council founded by Pius IV., and is composed 
of cardinals, prelates, and doctors, being such as are 
most thoroughly versed in the holy canons. The ob- 
ject of this congregation is to interpret the decrees of 
the Council of Trent." 

We entered, therefore, into this chancery, and found 
ourselves in a large room, around which were placed a 
number of tables, and at each one a priest was seated 
and busy writing. The walls of this room were gar- 
nished with shelves full of pasteboard boxes and pa- 
* See Letter IX. 



THE CONGKEGATION OF THE COUNCIL. 165 

pers. The continual movement of persons going and 
coming showed the great amount of business that was 
here transacted. An old priest, seated at the end of 
the room, was distributing patents and rescripts to 
those asking for them, and levied the payment for 
them according to a fixed tariff. 

After traversing this first room, the curate conduct- 
ed us to the cabinet of Monsignior the Secretary, of 
whom he asked permission to visit the archives. 

The archives are composed of many rooms, full of 
papers, containing the decrees and the interpretations 
of the articles of the Council of Trent. Mr. Pasquali, 
smiling, remarked that he was no longer surprised that 
the Roman Church accused the Bible of obscurity, 
since it had succeeded in filling so many rooms with 
the interpretations of a council convoked especially to 
interpret the Bible in its own way. Mr. Pasquali ap- 
proached the guardian, an old and rather weak-minded 
priest, and said to him, 

''Are these all the decisions of the congregation?" 

"Oh," replied the priest, " you only see here a small 
part. The ancient ones are transported to the general 
archives in the Salvati Palace ; only the more modern 
ones are in this chancery, and every day we send out 
hundreds of new ones." 

"And all these decisions," demanded Mr. Pasquali, 
" are they paid for ?" 

" Certainly," replied the priest; "nothing is ever 
given here gratis." 

When we left this place we visited the chancery 
called the Congregation of the Fabric. 

"This congregation," said the curate, "was estab- 



166 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

lished by Pope Clement VIII. Its occupation was 
the care of the edifice of St. Peter ; but, as this admin- 
istration does not occupy it sufficiently, it comprises 
many other branches." 

For example, when we entered we were witnesses 
in a case which distressed me in my inmost soul. 

It was a priest disputing with the secretary, and 
this was the object of the discussion : This priest had 
gathered together, from different devotees, sufficient 
money to say five thousand masses. But he had 
spent the money, and the masses had never been said. 
Then the priest demanded of the Congregation of the 
Fabric a dispensation of the obligation of saying these 
masses. The whole thing was according to rule, as 
this dispensation is granted to all : there was no dis- 
pute as to that. It was as to the price that they dif- 
fered. The secretary wanted him to pay one bajocco 
(cent) for each mass, according to the tariff, which 
amounted in all to fifty dollars. But the priest said 
that he had a right to a reduction on account of the 
great number of masses for which he desired a dispen- 
sation, and, as he came often to get similar dispensa- 
tions, he deserved some consideration ! ! This was the 
cause of dispute. As for me, I blushed with shame, 
and the curate was as much annoyed by this incident 
as myself. We left this place, therefore, and, leav- 
ing my friends, I returned home, more humbled and 
troubled than ever. 

I tell you the whole truth, my dear Eugene, and I 
know not how all this will end. I pray to God to 
preserve me in my faith, but I feel it giving way. 
You, also, pray for me. Yours affectionately, 

Henry. 



AN INTERVIEW. 167 



TWELFTH LETTEE. 

Eome, April, 1847. 

Dear Eugene, — After the terrible evening that I 
spoke to you about in my last, and after the circum- 
stance respecting that priest who bargained for the 
absolution of a sacrilegious robbery, my mind was 
troubled with most cruel doubts. A long time had 
already elapsed since my master had spoken to me in 
college, when, the day after the above occurrence, he 
called me into his chamber after the lesson. I went 
in, and found there with him two old Jesuits: all three 
maintained the most serious appearance. 

My professor spoke to me, and said, 

" My son, it is my duty to warn you that you are 
running into great danger. You did not choose to fol- 
low my advice ; you have continued your discussions 
with this heretic Waldensian ; you have not brought 
the Puseyite to us ; hence your own faith is begin- 
ning to waver, the Puseyite is returning to Protest- 
antism, and you — what will become of you? You are 
on the brink of a great abyss, but still you have time 
to save yourself." 

You know that I am naturally timid and very nerv- 
ous, so that this discourse alarmed me greatly. Nev- 
ertheless, I maintained courage enough to tell him that 
it was not so much my discussions with the Walden- 
sian as what I had seen with my own eyes that troub- 
led me. I related to him then all that Mr. Manson 



168 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

had written to me, all that I had seen in the different 
chanceries, and what had been told me by the curate, 
whose name I imprudently mentioned. 

"All these things are trifles," replied the father; 
" these chanceries are direjcted by men who may abuse 
their position, but the principle on which they repose 
is the unlimited power of the Holy Father, as the vicar 
of Jesus Christ, and as the successor of the great apos- 
tle Saint Peter. 

"But you know what is taught by the great Fag- 
nani, that it is not lawful to discuss the acts of the 
Pope, because every thing he does is done by the au- 
thority of God. You know, also, that the Cardinal 
Zubarella, a very learned theologian, sustained the 
proposition that God and the Pope are one and the 
same as regards their decisions {Deus et Papa faci- 
U7it unum consistorium) ; and, in a certain sense, the 
Pope is more than God, because he can do in good con- 
science unlawful things, which God could not permit 
himself to do {Papa facit quidquid libet^ etiam illi- 
citae et est plus quam Pens). And our Cardinal Bel- 
larmine teaches that, if the Pope should commit an er- 
ror by commending a vice and forbidding a virtue, all 
true Christians would be obliged, under the penalty of 
sin, to believe that vice is virtue and virtue is vice.^ 
you know that the holy Council of Lateran, V., in the 
sixth section, termed the Pope God on earth ; and in 
the tenth he is called the Savior of the Churchy These 
are the doctrines which should be upheld by good Cath- 
olics. The abuses of ministers can not in any way 
affect these doctrines." 

^ Bibl. de Romano Pontifico, lib, iv., chap. v. 



AN INTERVIEW. 169 

^"^But, my father," said I, *•' these are not abuses, 
but principles : to declare the bones of an ordinary and 
unknown body to be those of a saint ; to sell indulg- 
ences ; to absolve for money from sacrilegious robbery 
— these appear to me a horrible abuse of principles." 

I spoke these words with some vehemence ; and I 
perceived the two Jesuits looking at each other in a 
mysterious manner. As for the professor, without be- 
ing in the least disconcerted, he replied, with the great- 
est calmness, that he who, by his word alone, could 
transform bread into the body of Jesus, could with 
much more ease transform the bones of a pagan into 
those of a saint ; that the power of the Pope was un- 
limited. 

As to payment for indulgences, he told me that the 
money paid was not the price of the grace obtained, 
which would be worth infinitely more, but that it was 
a part of the price of the meritorious work that ought 
to be done to obtain this grace. 

As I did not appear much convinced by these argu- 
ment^, one of the Jesuits joined in, and told me that 
while I was in this state of mind I must avoid partak- 
ing of the sacraments at the feast of the Passover, and 
that immediately after this feast the exercises of Saint 
Eusebius would commence, which they advised me to 
follow ; promising me perfect peace of conscience if, 
however, I would abstain from all communication with 
my three friends, with whom they positively forbade 
all association. 

As I sought this peace in all sincerity, I promised 
to follow the exercises ; but as regarded my friends, I 
promised to avoid them as far as I could, but to re- 

H 



170 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

fuse to speak to them when I met them was out of the 
question. 

Then the professor, rising from his chair, said, 

" If you ever speak with those heretics again, you 
are a lost man!" 

After that he dismissed me coldly. On Palm Sun- 
day I went to the Church of Saint Peter to see the 
Pope bless the palms. I mingled in the crowd and ob- 
served the Holy Father, who, from his throne, sur- 
rounded by cardinals and prelates, was distributing 
palms to those of his court, and to some few foreign 
lords admitted to this great honor. I admired the de- 
votion of both French and English noblemen, who 
prostrated themselves before the Pope, kissed his feet, 
and received with great joy from his hands a small 
olive-branch. I was startled by a voice from behind 
me, which said, 

" Oh I what a sublime sight !" 

"Yes," replied another voice, "horribly sublime! 
It is the mystery of iniquity developing itself! What 
a correspondence, or, rather, what a contrast between 
the touching sight which occurred eighteen centuries 
ago at Jerusalem and that which they are here mim- 
icking!" 

I turned to see who spoke thus, and found myself 
face to face with my three friends. After the cere- 
mony of the palms, mass commenced. Instead of the 
Gospel of the day, three deacons sing alternately the 
history of the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ as re- 
lated by Saint Matthew. One, representing the Evan- 
gelist, sings the whole history ; another represents the 
character of Christ, and sings all the words spoken by 



PALM SUNDAY. 173 

him ; the third represents the crowd, and sings all 
those passages pronounced by the Jews, the Pharisees, 
Pilate, etc. 

Mr. Sweetman seemed scandalized. It appeared to 
him that to sing thus the Passion of Jesus Christ, and 
to represent those personages, was derogatory to the 
solemnity of the act related, and was rather a scene 
for the theatre than for the Church. But Mr. Manson, 
who appreciated the thing better, was extremely edified. 

"This external ceremony," said he, "is more im- 
pressive to the senses of the faithful. The singing of 
the Gospel is, besides, a very ancient usage of the 
Church." 

"Do you suppose," said the Waldensian, "that 
Saint Peter sang the Gospel?" 

During the singing the cardinals and prelates re- 
main standing. The Pope, descending from his throne, 
retires into a room prepared for the occasion in one of 
the angles of the church, and hung with damask. From 
time to time a prelate came out from this room to call 
some one of the cardinals, who passed into the cham- 
ber of the Pope, and returned soon afterward. This 
coming and going caused a great disturbance, and the 
Waldensian asked us to approach the chamber of the 
Pope, and see what was going on within. We endeav- 
ored, therefore, to do so, but the Swiss soldiers kept us 
back, and prevented our advancing to look on. In 
spite of this, we observed, at the side of this chamber, 
another little room hung with tapestry, where jellies 
and other refireshments were being prepared, and we 
heard a burst of laughter proceed from the damask 
chamber; then we understood the mystery, and we 
looked at each other with astonishment. 



174 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

" Behold," said the Waldensian, "the occupation of 
the Pope while the Passion of our Lord is being sung 
in the church ! While every Christian should weep in 
hearing the recital of the Passion of the Son of God, 
he who calls himself the head of his Church is regal- 
ing himself with sweetmeats and bursting with laugh- 
ter. Monsieur I'Abbe, and you, Mr. Manson, what do 
you say to this ? Defend, if you can, this action, which 
I can not attempt to characterize." As, for me, I turn- 
ed my back and left the church. 

I will not mention, for fear of wearying you, the 
thoughts that this event gave rise to in my mind. On 
Thursday I returned to Saint Peter's to witness the 
other ceremonies. 

After mass is said in the Sistine Chapel, the Pope 
enters Saint Peter's, and, when he is seated on his 
throne, a deacon sings the first fifteen verses of the 
13th chapter of Saint John. Then the Pope, having 
taken a fine linen napkin, descends from his throne, 
and approaches the pilgrims. The pilgrims are twelve 
foreign priests belonging to different nations, who rep- 
resent the twelve apostles. They are dressed in an 
Eastern costume, and wear on their head a great white 
cap. They are seated on elevated benches, and each 
one has before his feet a copper basin full of water ; 
then the Pope passes before them, touching their feet 
and pretending to wash them, and then returns to his 
throne. This ceremony is called the washing of feet. 

In former days I was much edified by this ceremony, 
but a remark of Pasquali made me consider it differ- 
ently. He said that every thing they could not pos- 
sibly efface from the Gospel they turned into a farce. 




THE SISTINE CHAPEL DURING MASS. 



THE TWELVE PILGRIMS. 179 

After this ceremony we witnessed another, which 
the Waldensian also called a comedy. It was the 
representation of the Supper of the Lord. 

In a vast hall above the vestibule of the church a 
table had been spread, raised upon a platform, and el- 
egantly decorated with an abundance of silver, porce- 
lain, flowers, and fruits. Thousands of spectators 
were present at this repast. The twelve priests, 
dressed in Eastern costume, were seated at table and 
ate with good appetite. The Pope appeared, carrying 
a dish, from which he served them ; then he retired. 
The spectators, having nothing farther to see, did like- 
wise.^ This is the representation at Rome of the 
Supper of the Lord. 

The Waldensian, turning toward us, said, with a 
most serious voice, 

"Do you know how to define exactly Roman Ca- 
tholicism ? It is the Gospel in burlesque." 

I endeavored to justify these usages as far as I 
could, but I admit to you that they were far from 
agreeable to me. 

On Friday I returned to Saint Peter's, where they 
sang, as on the preceding Sunday, the Passion of our 
Lord, according to the account given by Saint John. 
The Pope had not yet arrived ; he only appeared after 

^ Note hy the Translator, — The disorders attendant upon these cer- 
emonies are notorious. While present at the ceremony of the Holy 
Supper a few years since, the translator saw an Englishman, who was 
endeavoring to extricate himself from the stifling crowd and gain a 
breathing-place, felled to the floor by the halberd of one of the Swiss 
Guards, As soon as the Pope had retired, the apostle priests filled 
their pockets and handkerchiefs with the good things of the table, 
and the spectators scrambled for the rest. 



180 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

the singing. Then commenced the adoration of the 
cross. The cardinal who was celebrating it, after nu- 
merous genuflections, placed himself at the left of the 
altar, at the bottom of the steps. A deacon presented 
him with the cross covered with a black veil. The 
cardinal uncovered the right arm of the cross ; then 
raising it up toward the people, he sang, ^^ Behold the 
wood of the cross ; come^ let us adore it.'''' Then the 
Pope, all the cardinals, the clergy, and the people 
kneeled down and adored the cross. ' The cardinal 
ascends the steps of the altar, and, uncovering the left 
arm of the cross, he sings the same words, but in a 
higher tone. This is the second adoration, and lasts 
a little longer than the first one. Finally, he takes 
his place at the middle of the altar, uncovers the whole 
cross, and sings the same words, but in a still higher 
tone, and then the third adoration takes place. Every 
one remains kneeling till the cardinal has advanced to 
the centre of the church, where, with great solemnity, 
he deposits the cross on a carpet laid there for that 
purpose ; then, after making a genuflection, he returns 
to his place. Then the choristers chant a plaintive 
air, and the Pope, taking off his shoes, descends from 
his throne, and thus, bare-footed, prostrates himself 
and adores the cross. After him, all the cardinals, 
bishops, and priests follow his example, and afterward 
the people are allowed to do the same. 

I was extremely moved at this sight. To see the 
Pope humble himself thus before this representation 
of the cross of Christ can not but prove affecting to 
every good Catholic. Mr. Manson partook of my 
emotion. Pasquali himself appeared troubled, and I 





^®^''^'<4^'-^'-^ 



SUNDAY OF THE PASSOVER. 187 

thought he was moved by this sight, so I demanded 
of him, when we left the church, the reason of his ag- 
itation. 

'*A Christian," said he, "can not but be troubled 
at the sight of this iniquity. In the Eoman Church 
every thing serious is turned inte comedy, and the 
most solemn acts of the Church are pure idolatry." 

Here we commenced a discussion on the worship of 
the cross and images, which I will reserve for a follow- 
ing letter, so as not to interrupt my present narration. 

The ceremonies of Holy Saturday are scarcely wor- 
thy of mention ; the benediction of the fire, the paschal 
wax, baptismal fonts, is all that takes place.* 

At length arrives the Sunday of the Passover, the 
great day of the feast. 

The whole church of Saint Peter is decorated for 
this festival. 

The entire garrison of Rome is on parade in the 

great square ; the Grenadiers, the Swiss Guard, the 

most distinguished citizens, the Guard of the Eoman 

Senate, and the Noble Guard, are drawn up in order 

of battle in the church, to form an inclosure for the 

papal retinue, and surround the altar and the throne. 

The trumpets sound the arrival of the cortege. The 

* This remarkable practice of the sprinkling of various objects, of 
secular as well as religious uses, with holy water, is one of the most 
palpable vestiges of heathenism to be witnessed at Rome. On the 
Saturday before Easter, a number of such objects are thus aspersed; 
but it is upon the feast of Saint Anthony, a few weeks earlier, that 
the sprinkling of dumb beasts takes place — horses, mules, donkeys, 
etc., which are thus warranted against q,y\\ for the ensuing twelve 
months. This ceremony, which is performed at the door of the 
church of San Antonio Abate on the 17th of January, is represent- 
ed in the engraving on a previous page. 



188 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

papal cross, borne by a prelate, in the midst of seven 
gilded candlesticks, precedes the train ; after it follows 
a long procession of prelates, wearing large red cloaks ; 
next are carried five papal mitres, very precious, and 
the triple crown ; then come the cardinals, dressed ac- 
cording to the order to which they belong, with cloaks 
of silver cloth richly embroidered with gold ; at last 
comes the Pope himself, on a throne carried by men. 
On either side is borne an immense fan, made of 
the most precious feathers. As he passes, the people 
kneel. 

"Did Saint Peter enter thus into the assembly of 
the faithful ?" asked the Waldensian. 

Arriving at the altar, the Pope descended from his 
portable throne to ascend one that had been construct- 
ed for him at the right of the altar ; there he changed 
his dress, and put on the richest pontifical ornaments ; 
then he ascended the great throne, and commenced to 
say mass. 

While the choir were singing the Kyrie Eleison 
(Lord, have mercy on us !), the cardinals came, one 
after the other, to adore the Pope. 

In the grand mass of the Pope, called pontifical, the 
Gospel is sung in Greek and Latin, but with this dif- 
ference — the latter is sung by a cardinal, and the for- 
mer by a simple deacon. The book of the Gospel, in 
Latin, is also placed between seven candlesticks", while 
the one in Greek has only two ; and all this is design- 
ed to demonstrate, according to the doctrine of the 
Council of Trent, how much the authority of the trans- 
lation of the Vulgate is superior to the text of the 
Bible itself. 



THE POPE IN COMMUNION. 191 

I will not relate in detail the remarks of the Walden- 
sian ; suffice it to say that Mr. Manson himself ap- 
peared shocked at what he saw, although he could not 
but admire the majesty of these ceremonies. 

But what displeased me more than all the rest was 
the communion. The Pope, after the singing of the 
Gospel, continued to say mass ; but to receive the 
communion he ascended again to his throne, and there 
a deacon brought him the consecrated wafer ; and al- 
though, on the preceding Friday, he had kneeled to 
adore the image of the cross, yet he now remained on 
his throne in the presence of the holy sacrament. The 
deacon then brought him a golden goblet, while he, 
standing, drank through a golden reed the consecrated 
wine. 

" Oh ! your Pope !" said the Waldensian, " he does 
not believe in the real presence of Jesus in the sacra- 
ment, or, if he believes in it, he is certainly that man 
of sin of whom Saint Paul speaks in the second epistle 
to the Thessalonians : ' Who opposeth and exalteth 
himself above all that is called God, or that is wor- 
shiped, so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, 
showing himself that he is God.' (2 Thess., ii., 4.)" 

After the mass the procession formed again ; the 
Pope reascended his portable throne, and was thus car- 
ried up to the great balcony to bless, at the sound of 
music and the noise of cannon, the immense crowd 
that covered the place of Saint Peter's. 

I will not tell you now what the Waldensian said 
on this occasion, and I will only add that I have pass- 
ed a very uncomfortable Easter-day. My conscience 
torments me. I dare not approach the Paschal com- 



192 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

munion. I know not whether I ought to attend the 
spiritual exercises of Saint Ignatius, as I was advised 
to do by the Jesuits. 

In my next you will know what I have decided upon. 

Dear Eugene, pray for me, for I am in a truly de- 
plorable state. Adieu. Believe me yours, 

Henry. 



IMPRISONMENT. 193 



THIRTEENTH LETTER. 

Rome, April, 1849. 

My dear Eugene, — After two years of trial and 
suffering, behold me again enjoying the light of day, 
and the sweet liberty which I thought to have lost 
forever. And you, dear Eugene, you supposed you 
had lost your friend, but behold, yoirhave found him, 
and doubly found him ; for not only is he returned to 
you alive, but, still more, delivered from all his errors 
and prejudices, and you find in him a brother in our 
common Father and Lord Jesus Christ. 

What the discussions and arguments of my good 
friend the Waldensian could not do, has been done by 
the grace of the Lord. Two years spent in the prisons 
of the Inquisition, a long and serious study of the Gos~ 
pel, and sincere and fervent prayer, have awakened 
within me a faith that was unknown to me before. 

The Lord, whom I did not seek, came himself, and 
sought me out in prison, and the Good Shepherd has 
led the strayed sheep to his fold. 

I know not how to begin, I have so many things to 
tell you : my imprisonment, my trial, my sufferings, 
my conversion, and my deliverance, are so many sub- 
jects of deep interest to you, and I should like to re- 
late them all in a single breath. But this being im- 
possible, I will begin with my liberation, and by a de- 
scription of those terrible prisons, which will aid jov 

I 



194 ROME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

in understanding what I have to tell you afterward 
about my trial. 

Do not expect a studied narrative. My relation 
shall be simple, and in my customary manner. 

It was on the 27th of last March, toward sunset, 
that I heard in the corridor which led to my dungeon a 
tumultuous sound as of persons walking rapidly along, 
clamorous and shouting loudly, but whose words were 
too indistinct for comprehension. The opening of the 
dungeon doors, the threats and blasphemies which re- 
sounded through this lower corridor, showed that some 
extraordinary occurrence was taking place. As for me, 
who had nothing but misery to expect, I threw myself 
on my knees and began to pray, recommending my 
soul to God, when, with a great clash, my door was 
burst open. A man of small stature rushed in first, 
and embraced me, hanging on my neck, and overcome 
with tears. It was the minister Sterbini^ the author 
of the decree of the abolition of the Holy Office. Oth- 
ers followed, and embraced me in their turn. Sterbini 
confided me to the care of two of them, and said to me, 
'' You are free ; now I fly to deliver the others." 

I was suffering from an extreme weakness in my 
limbs, caused by a long sojourn in a close dungeon, so 
that I could hardly walk. The two men took me in 
their arms, and carried me, as if in triumph, into the 
midst of the crowd of people assembled in the court- 
yard, who, upon seeing me, began to shout with joy 
and to clap their hands, crying out, '''Hurrah for lib- 
erty of conscience /" I was carried to a room with the 
other liberated prisoners, and there the good people of 
Rome, so different from their priests, endeavored to re- 



LIBEEATION. 195 

store our strength by soups, wine, and cordials. The 
number of liberated prisoners in this room soon in- 
creased to about thirty. Now Sterbini returned, much 
fatigued, and asked each one of us where we desired 
to be led. As for me, I replied, being a stranger, I 
was without a home, but if they would be good enough 
to take me to the curate of the Magdalene, he would, 
perhaps, be good enough to receive me. 

" The curate of the Magdalene, whom you seek," 
said Sterbini, " discovered what the priests were before 
you, and he has left Rome, and with Rome he has 
abandoned the Roman religion." 

At this news I could not but raise my eyes toward 
heaven, and give thanks to God for bringing over this 
man to his Gospel. Then one of the gentlemen pres- 
ent begged me to accept a room in his house, which I 
did, and I am still living with him. Thanks to the 
kindness of my host, and the active care of an excel- 
lent physician, I was enabled to go out within a very 
few days. Yesterday, the 4th of April, I took my first 
walk. On this day the gates of the Holy Office were 
thrown open to the public, so that every one might in- 
spect the place where so much iniquity had been per- 
petrated. My host begged me to accompany him as 
guide through these prisons. 

The palace of the Roman Inquisition presents ex- 
ternally a style of architecture both simple and severe. 
Its lonely position, the gigantic edifice of the Vatican, 
which seems to tower above it, the iron gates that se- 
cure its entrance, and the solemn silence which reigns 
around it, give to these prisons an imposing aspect. 
It is composed of two rectangles united by a trapezi- 



196 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

um. The first part of the rectangle, facing on the 
street, constituted the ancient palace of the ferocious 
Michael Ghilieri, who became later Pius V., the instiga- 
tor and author of the massacre of Saint Bartholemew's 
Eve. He made a present of this building to the In- 
quisition, who added a number of chambers, and con- 
verted it to the use of the father inquisitors and those 
attached to the Holy Office. The other part of the 
rectangle is destined for prisoners. 

We ascended to the first story. An immense hall 
leads to two large and commodious apartments ; the 
one belongs to the father commissary, and the other 
to Monsignior the Assessor. These apartments were 
unfurnished, their possessors having saved the furni- 
ture. Thence we entered into the hall of this dread 
tribunal. At the end, in front, are placed the colossal 
arms of Pius V. ; a large arm-chair for the father com- 
missary, surmounted by a huge crucifix ; an elliptical 
table, with twenty chairs for the consultors of the Holy 
Office, and a picture of the terrible Guzman (St. Dom- 
inic), composed the whole of the furniture. Thence 
we passed into the Archives. An inscription in large 
characters, placed above the door, interdicted the en- 
trance under penalty of excommunication. Disregard- 
ing this prohibition, multitudes were passing through, 
and we entered with them a large room, having its 
four walls garnished with shelves full of papers. A 
number of tables, with writing materials, were to be 
found in this first part of the Archives, called the 
Chancery. Here it is that the records of all the mod- 
ern trials, dating from the middle of the last century 
down to the present time, were kept. From this we 



PRISON OF THE INQUISITION. 197 

proceeded to the library. All the correspondence of 
the Holy Office, all the works which speak in praise of 
the Inquisition, in whatever language they might have 
been published, are embraced in this library. Another, 
and the most precious portion, contains a complete col- 
lection of the works of the Italian reformers — works for 
the most part unknown to the most learned biblio- 
philes, because the greater part have been destroyed. 
I had no idea that the Italians had written so much in 
favor of the Gospel. However, the most interesting 
part of this library is composed of manuscripts found 
by the Inquisition in possession of heretical priests 
who were imprisoned, or of those whose property was 
sequestrated by the censor. 

The third part of the Archives contains the ancient 
proceedings commenced in the time of Pius V. There 
are to be found the famous trials of Luigi Pasquali, of 
Antonio Paleario, of Carnesecchi, and of many others 
burned in Rome for the cause of the Gospel. There 
the horrible plans of organization of the Valteline mas- 
sacres are stowed away ; there are the documents of 
the Gunpowder Plot of England, and the Saint Bar- 
tholomew Massacre of France, and many other docu- 
ments, which, if published, would show what Popery is. 

Fronf^the Archives we passed on to another room 
entirely bare; two side-doors opened into the apart- 
ments of the two fathers, called companions. 

We entered into the room of the second companion, 
whom I knew well, as it was he who filled the office 
of judge-instructor, and I had often been examined by 
him. In the very chamber where I had been ques- 
tioned, and under the very place where I was seated, 



198 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

I beheld an open trap. Wishing to see what it was, 
we descended by a little staircase, which led us to a 
recent opening made in the wall by the order of the 
government of the republic, and this ended in a sub- 
terranean cavity like a sepulchre : the earth on its 
bottom was black and spongy. On one side the earth 
was heaped up, covering half-buried human skeletons. 
My heart failed me at this sight, and my guide was 
overflowing with indignation at these horrible sights. 

In the middle of the second rectangle, where the pris- 
ons are, is a damp and dark court-yard, and all around 
it are small gates with bars of iron, showing where the 
old dungeons were: they are little cells, low, damp, 
and hardly large enough to contain one person. Be- 
low these cells are subterraneous passages, formed by 
the ruins of the ancient Circus of Nero — ruins which 
appear to have been always destined to be sprinkled 
with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus. 

In one of these subterranean places there still ex- 
ists, in an angle, about thirty steps of a stone staircase, 
where the unfortunate victims who were condemned to 
die by being walled up were made to descend. 

The skeletons found at the bottom showed how 
these barbarous executions were consummated. The 
victims, their hands bound behind their backs, were 
buried up to their shoulders in earth mixed with lime ; 
then the opening was walled up, and they were left 
to die by starvation. The convulsive movements of 
these skeletons showed the horrible struggle they had 
sustained before death. We left this infernal abode, 
and continued our visit to the ancient prisons. A little 
corridor to the left of the one already described con- 



PRISON OF THE INQUISITION. 199 

ducted US to a small court-yard worse than the first. 
Here there are sixty very small dungeons, divided into 
three stories. In each of these dungeons can he seen 
an enormous iron ring, which served to clasp the waist 
of the prisoner. In some this ring was fastened to 
the wall, and in others to the pavement. In the cen- 
tre of one of these dungeons was a round stone, which 
the government had removed, and it was found to 
cover a hole in which many skeletons could be seen. 
No one knows whether the individuals found in this 
place were buried dead or alive. In the midst of so 
many horrors, we were deeply affected on reading the 
half-effaced inscriptions on the walls. One of them 
ran thus : " The Lord is my shepherd ; I shall not 
want." Another: "The caprice and cruelty of man 
shall never separate me from thy Church, O Christ, 
my only hope." A third was this: "Blessed are 
they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for 
theirs is the kingdom of heaven." 

I was weary of beholding these barbarities, and we 
passed on to the modern prisons. They are composed 
of two compartments. Each of these prisons is in the 
form of a narrow cell. They are separated by a long 
and narrow corridor. On each door is placed a cruci- 
fix, but the countenance of Christ is represented, not 
with the mild expression of him who uttered the 
touching prayer, " Father, forgive them, for they know 
not what they do." It was, on the contrary, mena- 
cing and ferocious. Inside each dungeon is written, in 
large letters, a passage from the Bible. These pas- 
sages are chosen from the most threatening of those 
found in the law and the prophets, not a single pas- 



200 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

sage speaking of compassion or pardon. In vain you 
would seek for a word of this sort in the dictionary of 
the Inquisition ; never a sentiment of pity, pity to 
heretics being a heresy. In my prison, for instance, 
there was written the sixth verse of Psalm cix. : " Set 
thou a wicked man over him, and let Satan stand at 
his right hand." In another dungeon there was writ- 
ten the seventeenth verse of the same Psalm: "As 
he loved cursing, so let it come unto him ; as he de- 
lighted not in blessing, so let it be far from him." 
And in a third was to be found the nineteenth verse 
of the twenty-eighth chapter of Deuteronomy : "Cursed 
shalt thou be when thou comest in, and cursed shalt 
thou be when thou goest out." 

There remained to be visited the ancient hall of tor- 
ture, situated under ground, and approached by a nar- 
row stone staircase. The instruments of torture no 
longer exist, but we saw still, fastened into the wall, 
an iron hook which sustained the axis of the wheel, 
and in the centre was a square stone, in which a post 
was fixed, which served for torture by means of a rope. 
Iron rings fixed in the dome showed the means of 
other tortures. A large chimney-place in one of the 
angles of the room indicated the place of torture by 
fire. But lately this chamber had been converted 
into the wine-cellar of the reverend father inquisitor. 
At the side of this cellar the republican government 
had had a wall torn down, which, although painted 
gray and in s\ich a manner as to appear ancient, yet, 
its mortar having been examined by masons, it was rec- 
ognized to be of very recent construction. This open- 
ing conducted into a high room where there were two 



A NEW FAITH. 201 

large ovens, made in the form of hives, and these 
ovens were filled with calcined bones. When the In- 
quisition could no longer burn its victims in public, 
they were burned secretly in these ovens. After hav- 
ing seen all these things, we left this hell never to re- 
turn. 

Dear Eugene, such is the place where your poor 
friend languished for two years. The iniquity of the 
trials surpasses that of the prisons. But the Lord has 
done great things for me. God has made use of the 
wickedness of men, and of those very men for whom I 
entertained so much esteem, to convert me to him. 

With all this, I have no idea what has become of 
my friends. I fear greatly lest the Waldensian may 
have been also thrown into prison by the Holy Office; 
but whether he has died in prison, or is alive and free, 
I can not ascertain. My host has promised to make 
all possible researches for them, and I await the issue 
with anxiety. I have not yet decided whither to go ; 
but while I remain in Rome, I will write you often, 
and will relate the history of my imprisonment and 
my conversion. Adieu, dear friend. . 

Heney. 
12 



I 

202 KOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 



FOURTEENTH LETTER. 

Kome, April, 1849. 

My dear Eugene, — You expect, no doubt, to find 
in this letter the account of my imprisonment, and 
such should be the object of this lettei; if I endeav- 
ored to follow a chronological order ; but I am anx- 
ious to unburden my heart by revealing a mystery of 
iniquity until now unknown to you. Perhaps you 
will say. What is this mystery of iniquity ? The In- 
quisition? .... No. It is Jesuitism! 

You know that I was a Jesuit both in heart and 
soul, although I did not wear the dress. You know, 
besides, that I followed the exercises of Saint Igna- 
tius with the most honest intentions. But some con- 
versations with Pasquali, of which I have never in- 
formed you, caused me to become more reserved in my 
intercourse with the Jesuits. 

My confessor of this order was the secretary of the 
father assistant of France, and as he held me in great 
consideration, and regarded me already as affiliated^^ 
he communicated many important things to me, and 
sometimes made me write his letters ; and so great was 
his confidence in me that he often left me alone in his 
chamber. On such occasions I endeavored to discov- 

* The Jesuits denominate those members of the Company who 
have not assumed the habit, but have secretly joined their body, affili- 
ated members. In France these are popularly called *' Jesuits of the 
short frock" — (Jesuites a robe courte). 



SYSTEM OF THE JESUITS. 203 

er the secrets of his correspondence ; and although I 
do not flatter myself that I succeeded in penetrating 
into them all, yet, by putting them all together, I be- 
lieve I have acquired a pretty good comprehension of 
the Jesuitical system. 

I will not relate in their order the discoveries I 
made, nor the letters I read ; I will only give the re- 
sults. 

The fundamental maxim of the Jesuits is, as I have 
already explained to you in speaking of the exercises 
of Saint Ignatius, as follows: "All means are good 
if they conduct to the end in view.'''' 

What end do the Jesuits propose to attain? you 
will ask. They reply, the greater glory of God. This 
is their motto ; but remark this, they do not say that 
their aim is the " glory of God" (which would be an 
aim entirely spiritual), but the greater glory of God ; 
and by this comparative they open the way to all sorts 
of interpretations. Thus, for instance, the glory of 
God would require that all men should arrive at a 
knowledge of truth by means of instruction and per- 
suasion ; but the greater glory of God, according to 
them, exacts that all men should be constrained to 
think like the Jesuits, under penalty of being damned. 
But what follows will show in clearer light the abom- 
inations of this principle. 

To attain their end, this is their practical argument : 
The greater glory of God demands the salvation of all 
men, but this salvation can not be obtained outside of 
the Catholic Church ; consequently, the greater glory 
of God consists in obliging all men to belong to the 
Roman Church. 



204 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

In the application of this principle the means are in- 
different. Thus one of the means by which the peoj)le 
remain or become Catholics is ignorance^ so that with 
them it is a duty to perpetuate ignorance among the 
people. A true Jesuit beholds in science the ruin of 
religion. But ignorance can not be maintained open- 
ly, because the people would be aware of it ; so it is 
maintained by feigning instruction. This is the rea- 
son the Jesuits seek the monopoly of education, to en- 
velop science in inextricable methods, and to divert 
the intellect with vain questions rather than with solid 
instruction ; and, should one of their novices surpass 
the rest, they would, by their great power, either per- 
secute him as a heretic or a liberal, according to the 
country he inhabited, and any writings of his would 
be put in the Index. To attract and maintain peo- 
ple in the Roman religion, superstition must be united 
to ignorance. Superstition may be evil in itself, but 
the end sanctifies the means. Thus all the modern 
Roman superstitions originate among the Jesuits ; and, 
as many persons will accept nothing in religion that is 
not ancient, the aid of falsehood and deception is call- 
ed in to demonstrate that the inventions of a few days' 
standing date back to the first centuries of the Church. 
Wise and sincere men soon unmask this imposture ; 
then the Jesuits declare them to be heretics, Jansen- 
ists, or unbelievers, and persecute them. 

All the principles of this mystery of iniquity can 
not be explained in one letter, therefore let us pass on 
to a consideration of its practical workings. 

In Rome the Jesuits act openly and fearlessly : they 
hold the entire city in their hands. As regards edu- 



SYSTEM OF THE JESUITS. 205 

cation, they give instruction in the great Roman Col- 
lege to more than a thousand youths. In the Ger- 
'/nan College they educate more than a hundred young- 
Prussians, Hungarians, Bavarians, and Swiss, to bo 
sent later to Germany as bishops or priests. In the 
Irish and Scotch Colleges, young men, destined to 
hold ecclesiastical benefices in those two countries, are 
educated. The English College is directed entirely 
by affiliated members. In the college of the Propa- 
ganda about three hundred young men of different 
countries are instructed and sent back to their respect- 
ive lands as affiliated Jesuits. They have also charge 
of the College of nobles^ where almost the entire nobil- 
ity of Rome are educated by the Jesuits, so that nearly 
all the instruction in Rome is Jesuitical. 

As regards the education of women, it is in the 
hands of the ladies of the Holy Heart and of the Good 
Shepherd, whose Jesuitism is notorious. 

All these young people are obliged to confess to the 
reverend father Jesuits, and this is their great harvest- 
field. Educated by them, and accustomed to hear 
their sermons, they can withhold nothing from these 
fathers, whom they esteem and venerate so highly. 

Jesuits ha^e a peculiar manner of hearing confes- 
sions. They are not content with the simple avowal 
of sins, but, by their kind and insinuating manners, they 
manage to gather from the youth who makes his con- 
fession all that relates to his family affairs, the con- 
duct of his parents, his household concerns, the names 
and conversation of the persons who frequent it, etc. 
Thus it is that innocent boys often become the accusers 
of their own parents, and this is one of the means em- 



206 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

ployed by the reverend fathers for their secret police. 
But this method alone would not attain their end. 
Therefore they have, in the Church of Jesus, a con- 
gregation of nobles, with which all the Roman nobility 
is associated. The Jesuits are its directors and con- 
fessors, and thus hold in their hands the nobility. 

They direct also a congregation of merchants, and 
become acquainted, through the confessional, witjj 
every thing relating to commerce. They also make a 
similar use of the congregation of mechanics, called 
prima primaria^ in the Church of Saint Ignatius^ 
and of the countrymen in the Church of Saint Vitale. 

They have in the galleys, at the Castle of Saint An- 
gelo, a congregation of galley-slaves, and thus act as 
their police. 

Another congregation established in the prisons ex- 
tends their dominion over the prisoners. And as the 
spiritual direction of the municipal soldiers (or gen- 
darmes) is confided to them, they are informed of every 
thing that occurs in the city. 

In the church of Caravita there is a congregation 
of ladies, to which nearly all the ladies of the city be- 
long ; besides, there is another congregation of so-call- 
ed half 'ladies^ to which those females who are not 
noble belong. Finally, the congregation of the Mis- 
sions is attended by the more bigoted mechanics, men 
and maid servants, grisettes, etc. 

The Jesuits are assiduous in their attendance at the 
confessional, and each confessor has his particular class 
of persons ; those who can best insinuate themselves 
into the mind of youth are assigned to confess young 
boys ; those who understand tlie nobility confess the 



SYSTEM OF THE JESUITS. 207 

nobles. Thus each class has its corresponding and 
appropriate Jesuit confessor. By this means they dis- 
cover every thing. 

The Jesuitical government is eminently monarchi- 
cal. There is but one head, who is the general ; and 
from all I could discover, this is the way they govern 
the world.. Each is compelled to yield a blind obe- 
dience to his superior, so that, according to their own 
expression, a Jesuit should be in the hands of his su- 
perior what a corpse is in the hands of a surgeon. A 
Jesuit should have no conscience, because his con- 
science is in the hands of his superior, so that (as their 
rule is) he should obey him except where the command 
is evidently a sin. But in the code of Jesuitical mo- 
rality, neither calumny, nor robbery, nor homicide are 
evidently sins. The father-general has divided the 
different kingdoms of the world into as many differ- 
ent provinces under his dominion. The three king- 
doms of the British Isles, for instance, form one prov- 
ince ; Italy another ; France another. Each kingdom 
constitutes but one province under the government of 
the general. Switzerland, being too inconsiderable to 
form a whole province, is divided between Germany 
and France. Each of these provinces has a represent- 
ative in Rome, called assistant. Every individual be- 
longing to the company is obliged to communicate ev- 
ery day to a Jesuit called the spiritual father^ or the 
superior of the college where he lives, every thing he 
sees, hears, or thinks. These fathers make extracts 
of the most important reports, and communicate them 
to the fathers of the province, who, in their turn, for- 
ward a weekly extract to the father-general, who, in 



208 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

his turn, makes a selection, and lays them before the 
Pope in a particular audience every Thursday even- 
ing. 

All this renders the father-general an object of dread 
even to crowned heads, because he holds in his hands, 
by means of consciences, all the reins of the Catholic 
society. The father-general, acting upon the state- 
ments he receives, agrees with his assistants as to the 
course to be followed. 

If he believes, for instance, that the greater glory of 
God demands the creation of a revolution in a king- 
dom, the general sends the order to his assistants^ who 
give notice to all the associates, and these, obeying as 
mere machines, speak and act as commanded, either in 
the confessionals or the pulpit ; so that the father-gen- 
eral, if not afraid of unveiling his intrigues, might often 
predict an event many months, or even years, before its 
occurrence. This is the reason why Jesuits are pro- 
tected by sovereigns and governments. If any power 
is opposed to them, it must sooner or later fall. 

In those places where the Jesuits have no legal ex- 
istence, the influence of the father-general is perhaps 
still greater, for there the Jesuits exist as missionaries 
or under some other name. The father-general sends 
to those countries the most artful men, who propagate 
their opinions secretly ; and many who would not dare 
to avow themselves Jesuits, connect themselves with 
the company under some other name without being- 
aware of it. 

My confessor, whom I have already spoken of, be- 
ing one day in better humor than usual, related to me 
incredible things respecting Jesuitism in England. 



SYSTEM OF THE JESUITS. 209 

He told me, for instance, that, in spite of all persecu- 
tions, they had never abandoned England ; that there 
, were more Jesuits there than in Italy ; they were to 
be found in all classes of society, in Parliament, among 
the Protestant clergy, among its bishops, and among 
the aristocracy. I did not comprehend how a Jesuit 
could become a Protestant minister, or how a Protest- 
ant bishop could be a Jesuit ; but my confessor com- 
manded silence, saying, '' Omnia munda mundis /" 
that Saint Paul became a Jew among Jews to save 
Jews ; so that there was nothing astonishing that a 
Jesuit should turn Protestant among Protestants to 
convert Protestants. 

But this is what I discovered with reference to the 
religious movement in England denominated Pusey- 
ism. The English clergy being extremely partial 
to their system of faith, it would have been impos- 
sible to change their doctrine on this point. The 
schemes and machinations set on foot by Bossuet and 
the Jansenists of France to unite the English clergy 
to the Catholic Church having been of no avail, the 
Jesuits of England tried other means, which was to 
demonstrate by history and ecclesiastical antiquity the 
legitimacy of the usages of the Anglican clergy. Then, 
by the aid of disguised Jesuits, the English clergy 
were induced to examine more minutely the subject 
of ecclesiastical antiquity. The end to be gained was 
to occupy students in long, laborious, and difficult in- 
vestigations, and thus to lead them away from the 
study of the Bible. While Bingham was publishing his 
excellent work on ecclesiastical antiquities, the Pope, 
being warned by the Jesuits, chose his best champions, 



210 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

to whom he distributed certain offices to occupy them 
with the same study ; and as documents of this sort 
abound in Rome, the Roman theologians had the ad- 
vantage, especially as they did not hesitate to commit 
changes and falsifications. 

Arrighi, Mamachi, and many others, published in 
Rome their Christian antiquities. The Jesuits of En- 
gland now stimulated the Anglican clergy to give them- 
selves up still more to this pursuit, and inspired them 
with the desire to visit Rome to judge with their own 
eyes. In Rome the Jesuits took great care not to 
convert those missionaries, as they wished to make so 
many apostles of them. In this manner the Jesuits 
of England and Rome succeeded in attracting a large 
proportion of the English clergy toward Puseyism. 

Such were the revelations of my confessor. 

As regards their tactics in Protestant countries, I 
may sum it up thus : what the Jesuits preach and 
practice in those countries would be elsewhere regard- 
ed as heresy. There they hold to fewer superstitions 
than in Catholic countries. They permit Catholics, 
in opposition to the decrees of the Popes and the Coun- 
cils, to read the Bible, and this in order to accuse Prot- 
estants of lying when they mention such things in dis- 
cussions. They insinuate themselves among the peo- 
ple by charitable works rather than by the confession- 
al. They spare no sacrifice in gaining the favor of 
the great and powerful, and endeavor to make them- 
selves indispensable by promoting internal dissensions. 
Thus, for instance, supposing that there exist in a 
Protestant country two parties, either in the adminis- 
trative or in the legislative body, the Jesuits, and all 



SYSTEM OF THE JESUITS. 211 

good Catholics acting under their direction, ought to 
remain neutral ; but, instead of doing so, they throw 
themselves in a mass upon the side of those who prom- 
ise them the greatest advantages. Thus combining 
with the victorious party, they endeavor to annihilate 
the vanquished ; having succeeded in this, they seek 
to destroy the party to which they attached them- 
selves, and to remain alone masters of the field of 
battle. 

But, you will say, how can such iniquity be ex- 
plained ? Are they men or demons ? It is impossi- 
ble to be so wicked without an aim. What, then, is 
this aim ? You will ask, too, if they can perform all 
this without immense riches? Where do they pro- 
cure these riches ? These are questions that can not 
be answered with few words. I shall postpone such 
replies for my next. In the mean time I shall remain 
at Rome, but shall leave it when I shall have found 
out what has become of Mr. Pasquali ; then I will in- 
form you of my future residence. 

Yours affectionately, Heney. 



-- AMr^^^wi'M'fiiiijjjjii 




SYSTEM OF THE JESUITS. 215 



FIFTEENTH LETTER. 

Rome, April, 1849. 

My DEAR Eugene, — I gave you, in my last, a gen- 
eral idea of the Jesuits and Jesuitism, but I desire still 
to give you some explanation with regard to their in- 
fluence, their morality, and wealth. If any one should 
attempt to judge the Jesuits of to-day or Jesuitism 
from what the writers of the last two centuries have 
said, he would Ibe greatly mistaken. Then Jesuitism 
was at open war with the Gospel and society, whereas 
modern Jesuitism is a contagious disease — a sort of 
epidemic, which, although it insinuates itself secretly, 
is none the less dangerous. 

Jesuitism formerly acted openly, like a conqueror ; 
the modern system acts secretly, like an assassin. To- 
day the Jesuits are no longer the confessors of kings, 
because no influence could be gained thereby ; they 
are no longer court preachers, because sermons and 
confessions affect no longer the hearts of sovereigns 
nor the destiny of nations. To belie what has been 
said of them, and to prove that they are entirely dif- 
ferent from what they are accused of being, they have 
chosen another road, so as to govern in their way both 
religion and society, and this way I have pointed out 
to you in my last letter. 

You asked of me. What end do the Jesuits propose 
to attain ? 

If you should put this question to them, they would 



216 ROME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

replj, " The greatest glory of God ;" but if you ques- 
tion the facts, you will be forced to conclude that it is 
an immoderate thirst for dominion ; to render them- 
selves necessary to the Pope and to kings, in order 
to govern the Pope and the whole Roman Catholic 
Church ; and, finally, to command kings and the en- 
tire world. 

This is the veritable aim of the reverend fathers. 
Thus Catholicism and Jesuitism, Jesuitism and des- 
potism, are one and the same thing. > 

Formerly there existed Jansenists and a Gallican 
Church, but all this has disappeared, and one can no 
longer be a good Catholic without being a Jesuit. 

"To attain the end, the means are indifferent." 
This is their favorite maxim. Thus, to rule the intel- 
lects of men, they seek to weaken them ; and, under 
the pretext of instruction, they fill the minds of youth 
with prejudices, so as better to maintain them in a 
state of ignorance slightly tinged with science. To 
govern in matters of religion, they have rendered re- 
ligion material and superstitious. They call them- 
selves the disciples of Jesus, not to model themselves 
on him, but to make of him a Jesus of their sort ; for 
if you take any book written by Jesuits and designed 
to nourish (as their expression is) the religion of their 
pupils, you will find, not the Jesus of the Gospel, but 
a Jesus so contracted as to resemble one of their own 
novices. It is with the same intention that they have 
invented all the modern superstitions, and reduced re- 
ligion to a material and hypocritical worship, entirely 
abolishing the Gospel idea of worship of spirit and in 
truth. They seek to command in politics, and to at- 



SYSTEM OF THE JESUITS. 217 

tain this end all means are good. Consequently, in 
order to become indispensable to sovereigns, they do 
not preach, with Peter and Paul, submission to estab- 
lished powers, but, personifying in themselves the Cath- 
olic religion, they preach and teach in the confession- 
al, in pulpits, and in schools, that the best sovereign 
is he who favors them most ; and if a government 
does not favor the reverend fathers, that government 
is heretical, and they do not cease to ascribe to it cor- 
rupt intentions. Pius IX., who did not favor them 
much in the commencement, was deemed by them a 
schismatic and an intruder, and they openly prayed 
for his conversion. If a sovereign should not be well 
inclined to the Jesuits, a revolution would certainly 
break forth in his kingdom. Under such circum- 
stances, they insinuate that obedience is not due to an 
irreligious sovereign ; and, making a false application 
of the passage which says, " We ought to obey God 
rather than man," and putting themselves in the place 
of God, they excite to disobedience and revolt. 

If a king is beloved by his subjects, the reverend fa- 
thers do not lose courage, but tell the people that the 
qualities they admire are like the enchanting voice of 
the siren, which only allures to destroy ; that those 
qualities are a snare of the devil, an artifice used by 
irreligious men to uproot from the souls of the subjects 
the precious treasure of the religion of their forefathers ; 
and they understand so well how to act and what to 
say, that, if a sovereign were desirous of the good of 
his subjects, he would be constrained to renounce his 
good dispositions in order to avoid a bloody revolution ; 
but should he retain the esteem of his subjects in spite 

K 



218 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

of the Jesuits, still they would cause great disturb- 
ances in the kingdom. 

Count Eossi was the only man who could maintain 
the statute law in Rome. I know that his assassina- 
tion was attributed, at the time, to the Liberals ; but all 
sensible men in Eome are persuaded that this murder 
was the consequence of secret manoeuvres of the Jesu- 
its to throw Rome into a bloody revolution. Rossi 
was assassinated, but other blood was not spared ; for 
then it was that Cardinal Antonelli, an associate of the 
Jesuits, ordered the Swiss Guard to fire on a disarmed 
and peaceable populace, who were demanding of the 
Pope a new ministry ; and as this infernal attempt was 
made in vain, it was this very Jesuitical party who 
constrained the Pope to abandon Rome, by alarming 
him with dangers that did not exist, to throw Rome 
into anarchy, and thus attain their end ; and now again 
they rule the Pope. Thus they try to carry out their 
plans in every kingdom. Dominion is their only end, 
and, to gain this, all means are good. Wherever they 
live, the Jesuits must reign or the country must perish. 

You would like to know now how the Jesuits ob- 
tain their immense riches. Their riches are for the 
greater glory of God. Thus all means to obtain them 
are good. From this it follows that what, according 
to evangelical doctrine, would be called robbery, rap- 
ine, fraud, plunder, etc., is with them only an innocent 
means to advance the greater glory of God. One of 
these means is the hypocritical poverty that they affect 
' externally. If you enter the chamber of a Jesuit, you 
will behold the evidence of an edifying poverty. A 
Jesuit never has a cent in his purse ; but this apparent 



SYSTEM OF THE JESUITS. 219 

poverty is only to throw dust into the eyes of the sim- 
ple. Far from wanting any thing, the Jesuit has in an 
. instant every thing he desires ; no prince possesses 
more than he : rich libraries, collections, mirrors, mas- 
terpieces of the fine arts, can be found in all the estab- 
lishments of the Jesuits ; their table, without being 
magnificent, is nevertheless better than the ordinary 
board of a gentleman, and their external poverty is 
only a mask to excite the charity of the simple-mind- 
ed. To exercise fraud they make use of another hy- 
pocrisy. Their '' professed houses" have no revenue, 
but are supported by charity ; that is to say, their rev- 
enues are not secured in their name, but in the name 
of the infirmary of sick Jesuits ; and by this means 
they obtain an income that far surpasses their wants ; 
and as they take pains to have it understood that their 
houses can not possess revenues, they go' about town 
collecting money, and thus enrich themselves with the 
charity of citizens. They will raise funds for their 
churches under one pretext or another, and thus amass 
considerable sums. Thus, a few years since, having 
embellished the grand altar of their church in Rome, 
they raised contributions for this object to the amount 
of a hundred thousand dollars. 

Other sources of revenue for the Jesuits are foreign 
and especially Protestant countries. The Jesuits edu- 
cate in Rome a certain number of young men from for- 
eign countries, and this furnishes them with a pretext 
for making secret collections in those countries for the 
support and education in Rome of their missionaries. 
My father confessor informed me that England alone 
sent yearly thousands of pounds sterling to Rome. 



220 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

I will not speak of the well-known society for the 
Propagation of the Faith, whose centre is in Lyons. 
The millions collected by that society every year are 
destined to plant Jesuitism where it does not yet exist. 

Another source of revenue is donations and legacies. 
If a rich man confesses to a Jesuit, he does not leave 
without having paid dearly for the absolution granted 
him ; not that the reverend father tells him, " Give 
me some money, or I will not absolve you ;" but he 
will begin by talking charity to him', and thus far 
there is nothing to say ; but then, by a misuse of the 
passage in the Gospel which says, ''Let not thy left 
hand know what thy right hand doeth," he insinuates 
that alms-giving is best to be performed by means of 
a religious person, who will not divulge the name of 
the donor. Quoting then another passage, where Je- 
sus praises the woman who poured on him precious 
ointment, they endeavor to show that the best charity 
made is to Jesus, and by Jesus they mean the Jesuits, 
and thus, also, they obtain large sums. If a man who 
has enriched himself by means of the wealth of others 
confesses to them, they make use of the parable of the 
unjust steward, ''Make to yourselves friends of the 
mammon of unrighteousness, that when ye fail they 
may receive you into everlasting habitations" (Luke, 
xvi., 9); and thus they insinuate that he should give 
these unjust riches to the Virgin and to the saints, to 
make friends who will receive him into heaven. At 
the death-bed of the rich they announce how difficult it 
is for a rich man to be saved, and after having fright- 
ened them thoroughly, they suggest that the only way 
remaining is to place their treasure in heaven, so that 



SYSTEM OF THE JESUITS. 221 

where their treasure is, there will their heart be also. 
Then, seeing that by a single stroke of the pen the 
kingdom of heaven is opened to him, the dying man 
willingly signs his will in favor of the reverend fathers. 
These are but a few of the methods they employ to 
em'ich themselves. But they make use of other means 
to maintain the esteem of the unsuspecting : they af- 
fect an austere morality, and great zeal for religion. 
It must be granted that their external conduct is seem- 
ingly irreproachable ; you never hear alleged against 
them such misdeeds as are related concerning other 
priests and monks ; and their convents are particular- 
ly free from disorderly scenes. This external show 
of austerity does not prevent them, however, from com- 
mitting unscrupulously all those atrocities which I 
have related to you, because these are necessary to the 
attainment of their objects, whereas gross immoralities 
would impede them in the pursuit of their aims. Thus 
the pivot of Jesuitical morals is self-interest; but as 
all persons under their direction do not choose to prac- 
tice an austere morality, they adapt their moral pre- 
cepts to the inclinations and tastes of the different kinds 
of men. I will not repeat what the celebrated Pascal 
has said with so much elegant wit in his Provindales^ 
but I assure you their morality is the same now as 
in his time, apart from some few accidental differences : 
they affect great devoutness, that they may insinuate 
themselves among penitents, but their religion consists 
in a horrible superstition; they endeavor to destroy 
the Gospel entirely. The Gospel teaches that the way 
that leads to eternal life is narrow, and few there be 
that enter the strait gate of salvation ; but the Jesuits 



222 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

teach a religion by whicli it is impossible not to be 
saved. For this purpose they have invented the sys- 
tem of Mariolatry (the worship of Mary), and they 
publish numerous books, and preach daily, that those 
who devote themselves to Mary can not be damned, 
even if their life had been most criminal. Mary will 
convert them at their death. For this purpose, again, 
they have introduced the devotion of their holy saint 
Fran9ois Xavier, and invented a new revelation, by 
which God has promised to grant to any one practi- 
cing this devotion once in his life any grace demanded 
of him. Also, you will see, during the days conse- 
crated to this devotion, the church of the Jesuits filled 
with the elite of society, who come to demand the 
grace of salvation, although they live in the practice 
of the vilest sins ; and the Jesuits, in the name of 
God and Franfois Xavier, assure them of their sal- 
vation. 

I should never finish if I were to narrate all the 
iniquities of the Jesuits ; besides, my sheet is full. 
These few remarks will suffice to give you a feeble 
idea of Jesuitism. 

In my next I will give you an account of my im- 
prisonment. 

Believe me yours affectionately, 

Henry. 



AEKEST. 223 



SIXTEENTH LETTER. 

Rome, May, 1849. 

Dear Eugene, — Here I am in a city besieged by 
French troops. If I wanted to talk politics, this would 
be a favorable moment ; but my plan being decided 
upon, I have nothing to do with politics, therefore I 
will not tell you either of the siege or the defense 
made, or of the proclamations or the popular insurrec- 
tions, these being matters that you can find in the 
papers. I will simply state that I am still in Rome, 
awaiting the arrival of my dear friend Pasquali, who 
is expected to return from a journey with his two 
friends, when we shall probably all go to England to- 
gether. 

I proceed to fulfill my promise to relate the inci- 
dents of my imprisonment. 

It was on the 5th of April, the Monday after Easter, 
at about nine in the evening, that two men presented 
themselves at my door. One of them, a tall and stout 
individual, after having closed the door, stood by the 
side of it ; the other, a small man, rather aged, and 
of an unpleasant expression of countenance, approach- 
ed me with repeated salutations, and said, 

" Is this the Abbe J ?" 

" That is my name," I replied. Then said the re- 
pulsive-looking man, 

'' In that case you will be so good as to follow me ; 



224 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

but fear nothing ; it will be well enough with you ; 
the Holy Office is compassionate." 

At the bare name of the Holy Office my eyes grew 
dim, my knees trembled, and I sank upon my chair ; 
a chill ran over me. The man continued to speak to 
me, but his voice fell in confused sounds upon my 
ear. 

A few moments afterward the superior of the con- 
vent appeared in my room, pale and trembling ; he was 
ordered, in the name of the Holy Office, to place my 
chamber under seal, and was warned that he was re- 
sponsible to the holy tribunal for any thing that might 
be lost. 

Then these two men, taking me each by one arm, 
tried to encourage me with feigned politeness, and thus 
led me from my chamber. The superior of the con- 
vent then placed a seal on my door, and handed to 
them his signet. After that they put me in a carriage 
to take me to the place of my destination. 

When we had entered the carriage my conductors 
revealed their true character. To the honeyed speech- 
es addressed to me before the superior succeeded most 
. base and barbarous insults. I pass them by, for their 
recollection is painful to me ; yet their insults drew 
me out of my deep despondency ; and perceiving that I 
was in the presence of a couple of contemptible bailiffs, 
I refrained from all complaint, and remained silent, un- 
til the stopping of the carriage informed me that I 
had reached my destination. 

A man of ferocious aspect opened the door, and one 
of my companions having descended, he ordered me to 
come forth, and gave me into the custody of the jailer. 



IMPRISONMENT. 225 

who seized my arm with his iron grasp, and led me, 
by the light of a lantern, into the prison. 

Hardly had I entered when a Dominican monk of 
athletic proportions presented himself, and with him a 
priest with paper and ink. Then the men who had ar- 
rested me related their proceedings to the priests, who 
took notes of them ; they consigned to them the signet 
which had served to seal my chamber ; then they un- 
dressed me, leaving me entirely naked, to examine 
whether I had any thing about me that concerned the 
Inquisition. They took away what little money I 
had, my penknife, shoestrings, collar, and handkerchief. 
As this treatment seemed to me unnecessarily brutal, 
I complained to the Dominican monk who was present, 
but he replied with hypocritical suavity that if I be- 
haved myself the articles should be returned, but that, 
for the present, charity obliged him to take away every 
thing that could facilitate my committing suicide. 

During this infamous proceeding I observed that 
my prison was a small square chamber, like a cell of 
a convent ; in one corner there was a bag filled with 
straw, in the other a broken pitcher ; finally, a table 
and stool, both attached to the wall, completed the fur- 
niture of this dungeon. The search ended, the Do- 
minican turned toward a jailer and said, in a solemn 
voice, 

" This prisoner is committed to your care; you are 
responsible for him to the Holy Office." 

The jailer made a profound bow, and all retired. 
The bolts were turned on me, and I stood alone in my 
prison. 

I can not express to you, my dear Eugene, the tem- 

K 2 



226 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

pest of emotions that rose within me at that moment. 
I remember only that a heavy hand, like a nightmare, 
seemed to crush my heart and nearly choked my breath- 
ing. I know not how long I remained in this state, 
but I do recollect that a great thought roused me from 
this terrible despair. At that moment I was not seek- 
ing God, but God was seeking me ; these words of 
the Gospel arose in my mind : Jesus had come " to 
preach the Gospel to the poor, to heal the broken-heart- 
ed, to preach deliverance to the captives^ to set at lib- 
erty them that are bruised" (Luke, iv., 18, 19), These 
words were a balm to my grief. I threw myself on 
my knees, and prayed from the fullness of my heart, 
and torrents of tears rolled down my cheeks. Then I 
was relieved ; I groped about for my mattress, threw 
myself upon it, and slept peaceably the whole night. 

My prison window looked toward the east ; the rays 
of the morning sun fell upon my eyes, and I arose. 
Oh ! how terrible to awake after a first night passed 
in prison ! You see it in all its horror, you feel the 
price of freedom lost ! I began to move about in my 
dungeon, but it was only three paces long, and the 
turning caused my head to swim, and I was forced to 
desist. I tried to open my window to let in the fresh 
air, but it was so high up I could not reach it. I 
waited with impatience for the jailer, and each quarter 
of an hour struck by the clock of Saint Peter's seem- 
ed to me a century. I heard no noise in the whole 
building, and it struck midday, and nothing as yet an- 
nounced that I was still in the land of the living. 

Discouragement, grief, solitude, and hunger so troub- 
led my imagination that I thought they had left me 



IMPRISONMENT. 227 

to starve. At last I heard a sound of keys in the cor- 
ridor, my door was opened, and a jailer entered bring- 
ing a little basket which contained my dinner. A 
small portion of bad soup in a leaden bowl, contain- 
ing about three ounces of meat, together with about 
twelve ounces of bread, composed my meal. No spoon 
or fork, knife or glass, plate or napkin — these are lux- 
uries refused to the prisoners of the Inquisition. 

The jailer placed my dinner on the table, and said, 
"Adieu till to-morrow ;" and, turning his back, he left 
me alone. 

In this manner were spent eight long days, during 
which I only, saw the disagreeable face of my jailer. 
On the eighth day I asked to see some one of the rev- 
erend father inquisitors. The jailer at these words 
burst into laughter, and scoffed at my boldness in dar- 
ing to ask for one of the fathers. 

"The fathers," said he, "are not the servants of 
the prisoners ; when they wish to see you they will 
ask for you ; meanwhile you can dispense with ask- 
ing for them." 

Then I told him why I wished to speak with some 
one of them : it was to beg them to change my prison, 
as I could not breathe in its stifling atmosphere, and to 
procure a few books as a pastime for such eternal days. 

"As for the prison," replied the jailer, "it is use- 
less to speak about it, because every room is full ; and 
as regards books and other conveniences, I can serve 
you as you may desire." 

I was at a loss to reconcile this offer of the jailer 
with his hard-hearted look and what I had heard of 
the rigors of the Inquisition ; I was surprised at the 



228 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

proposition. He, seeing my astonishment, explained 
himself, and said, 

''Do not believe that we jailers are as bad as is re- 
ported, nor that the Inquisition is as cruel as brigands 
pretend. The reverend fathers can not authorize a 
milder treatment of the prisoners, because it would 
contravene the rules of the Holy Tribunal ; but they 
confide in the jailers, knowing them to be honest men, 
and these furnish the prisoners with every thing that 
is agreeable to them — always, however, within the 
bounds of honesty ; so," said he "you have only to 
command, and I will bring you any thing you may 
desire, on the condition, however, that you give notice 
to the reverend father notary to pay for it out of your 
money." 

Then I confined myself to demanding two things : 
the first, that my window might be opened every 
morning; the second, that he would procure some 
books. The next morning, as desired, the jailer ar- 
rived with a large book under his arm, which he placed 
on the table ; he opened the window also, and then 
retired. I felt my strength return on breathing the 
fresh air ; but, alas ! the book was a collection of Le- 
gends of the saints. I would willingly have thrown 
it away, but was hindered by the urgent necessity of 
having something to read in order to occupy my sad 
leisure. However, the perusal of these apocryphal 
histories excited such profound disgust, that after three 
(lays I begged the jailer to change this book and to 
bring me a Bible. 

"A Bible!" exclaimed the jailer with horror, and 
falling back a step or two and opening his astonished 



IMPRISONMENT. 229 

eyes ; "a Bible ! That would be enough to bring the 
devil back into the Holy Office." 

To understand this expression, you must know that 
among the jailers of the Inquisition, as among the low- 
er classes of Rome, there exists a tradition, introduced 
and preserved by the priests, which is, that the pris- 
oners of the Holy Office, arrested for reasons purely 
religious, have frequent conversations and habitual in- 
tercourse with the Evil One, who often appears, dressed 
as a priest, in the corridors of the prison, where he 
walks ; and it is for this reason that the jailers, ig- 
norant and superstitious, hang crosses and pictures of 
saints on the walls of the corridors and prisons, and 
keep away every book stigmatized as heretical, which 
they believe would paralyze the effect of their crosses 
and images. He proposed instead of the Bible some 
romances and theatrical pieces, of which he said he 
had a large library at my disposal. I accepted, there- 
fore, other books, excluding, however, the romances and 
comedies ; he brought me then the Sermons of Segneri. 

I had already passed a month in prison without 
seeing any one but the gloomy face of my jailer. One 
morning he brought me the bill of my expenses. For 
having opened my window, cleaned my room a lit- 
tle, and procured books during twenty days, the bill 
amounted to six dollars. I signed the bill to be ac- 
quitted by the reverend notary. Thus the great rig- 
ors of the Inquisition can be avoided by money. 

Three months after my first imprisonment I was 
called up for examination, and it is fi'om that mo- 
ment that I date my most severe sufferings ; but I will 
relate the whole to you in my next letter. Adieu! 
Yours affectionately, Henry, 



230 KOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 



SEVENTEENTH LETTEE. 

Home, May, 1849. 

My dear Eugene, — Fifty days already had I lain 
suifering in this living sepulchre, seeing no one but 
my ferocious jailer, who, having robbed me of my last 
cent, did not cease to afflict me with all sorts of out- 
rages. 

One morning I heard my door open at an unusual 
hour ; for the first time my prison was swept ; then 
it was perfumed with laurel branches, which were 
burned to purify the air; my stool also was taken 
away and replaced by two chairs. The reason of 
these changes was a visit which was mysteriously an- 
nounced to me by the jailer. You can not imagine 
what a consolation I felt at receiving a visit ; but all 
my endeavors to learn the name of my visitor were 
useless. I could not get a word from the jailer. I 
waited in great anxiety, and my imagination conjec- 
tured a thousand dififerent persons, when at about ten 
o'clock my door was opened again, and the insulting 
voice of the jailer announced the Abbe Pallotta. 

The Abbe Pallotta is a man who enjoys in Rome 
a great reputation for sanctity ; of diminutive stature, 
emaciated form, bald-headed, and dressed in a coat of 
coarse stuff, which came down to his feet, he inspired 
the lower classes with great veneration. Tliis man 
was sent to convert me. On entering my prison, he 
took from his pocket a crucifix, a book, and a purple 



A VISITOR. 231 

stole ; then he drew from his sleeve an image of the 
Virgin in copper bas-relief; he placed all these on my 
table ; he put on his stole, and, prostrating himself be- 
fore his image, began to pray. After a few minutes 
of prayer, he seated himself, and invited me to kneel 
before him and make my confession. I replied that 
God only could forgive sins, and that I should not, 
therefore, confess to him. At this reply the Abbe arose 
terrified, and told me I was possessed of the devil, and 
that he would exorcise me. I replied, "It is those 
who barbarously persecute innocent men that are pos- 
sessed of the devil, so that if you desire to exorcise 
any body, be good enough to try your exorcism upon 
the father inquisitors and my jailer." At these words 
he was thunderstruck. He fell on his knees, drew an 
iron scourge from his pocket, and, by a sudden move- 
ment, threw open his coat behind, laying bare his shoul- 
ders, and began violently to strike his naked shoul- 
ders with the scourge, crying, "Be merciful, O Lord!" 
This action touched me deeply. I could not com- 
prehend this man, and remained some moments stu- 
pefied with astonishment ; but when I saw the blood 
trickle down his shoulders, I was so horrified that I 
threw myself on him, and snatched the scourge from 
his hands. Then, how I should have liked to have 
had Mr. Pasquali near me, to prove to this man, with 
deliberate coolness and by the Bible, how great was 
his religious fanaticism ! But he, rising, stood up and 
said, " My son, you fear a few blows with a scourge, 
but what will be the torments of hell that are prepared 
for you if you continue to reject the pardon of God 
that is offered to you ?" 



232 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

Then commenced between us a discussion on the 
conditions which God puts to the forgiveness of sins. 

I will not give you the details of this discussion, 
which lasted half an hour ; I will only say that to all 
the replies that I made, and to all the passages from 
the Bible that I cited, he opposed only prayers ad- 
dressed to the Virgin, whose image he kissed, begging 
her to deliver me from the power of the demon. He 
tried to make me kiss this image, and prostrate my- 
self before it ; but, seeing that I refused, he threw him- 
self again on his knees, and would have recommenced 
the scene of the flagellation, but I prevented him. Then 
he left me and went out, saying that this sort of de- 
mon could only be chased away by prayer and fasting. 

The scene enacted by this man troubled me in my 
soul. I passed the whole day distracted by my 
thoughts and doubts. The jailer returned soon after, 
accompanied by a priest, who sprinkled my prison with 
holy water, and threw a great quantity on me. 

The chairs were taken away, and, instead of my 
customary dinner, I only got a small piece of black 
bread. The jailer appeared to be seized with horror 
every time he entered my prison ; he neither spoke to 
me any more, nor replied to my questions. In this 
way I passed nine days. The seventh day after the 
scene related I was called up to be interrogated. Con- 
ducted by the jailer to the chamber of instruction, I 
found there the father Dominican who had visited me 
in prison the night of my arrest. He was seated on 
a large chair before a table ; on his left hand sat a 
priest, a notary, writing ; on his right was a large black 
crucifix ; and a piece of pasteboard, on which was writ- 



EXAMIXATIOX. 233 

ten the beginning of the Gospel of Saint John, was 
placed in the middle of the table. I remained stand- 
ing, with the jailer a little behind me. The judge-in- 
structor ordered me to swear on the Gospel to speak 
the truth. I took the oath, and was then allowed to 
take my seat on a wooden stool. 

After having asked my name. Christian name, pro- 
fession, etc., he asked me if I knew why I was detain- 
ed in the prison of the Holy Office. I replied that I 
did not. But, to render this interrogatory more clear 
to you, I will give you the questions and answers in 
the order they were made. 

" Can you at least conjecture the reason of your im- 
prisonment ?" 

''Perhaps on account of the intercourse I had with 
Protestants." 

" Why do you think so ?" 

"Because the father Jesuit threatened me with the 
Holy Office if I did not discontinue my conversations 
with those Protestants. I am sure it was he who de- 
nounced me." 

" Who were those Protestants you conversed with ?" 

I informed him of the names and country of my 
friends. 

"What were the subjects of your conversations?" 

I replied to this question as well as I could from rec- 
ollection. 

"What is your opinion on those subjects?" 

"For my opinions I am answerable to God alone; 
this tribunal, I think, has no right to judge of my be- 
lief." 

" You have taken an oath to reply to my questions. 



234 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

I warn you, therefore, that if you do not reply you will 
be guilty of perjury." 

Then I perceived the trick resorted to in compelling 
me to take an oath. I remained for a moment per- 
plexed as to the validity of an oath extorted in that 
manner, and I finally replied, 

'' It is not the fear of perjury, but the love of truth, 
that induces me to reply. I believe every thing taught 
in the Word of God ; not one syllable more or less." 

An infernal smile stole over the livid countenance 
of the brother, and he continued his interrogatory : 

''Have you communicated your opinions to any 
one r 

" I have spoken about them to my confessor." 

"Who is your confessor?" 

"Father M., a Jesuit." 

"And what did he tell you?" 

" I do not recollect positively ; but I know that his 
replies did not convince me." 

" Why did they not convince you?" 

" Because they were not based on the Word of 
God." 

" What do you mean by the Word of God?" 

"I mean the canonical books of the Old and New 
Testaments." 

"To how many persons have you communicated 
your opinions ?" 

"I have replied to my confessor only." 

" Swear to this point." 

" No, I will not swear to it" (for I was warned by 
the trick of the first oath). 
. My judge then told me that it was out of pure char- 



THE CHAMBER OF PROOF. 235 

ity that he gave me this advice ; by refusing to swear ^ 
was a proof that I had spoken false ; and, besides, the 
Holy Tribunal had proofs of my falsehood. Then I 
told him I should no longer swear to any point ; that 
the questions addressed to me were designed to entrap 
me ; and that, if he did not question me regularly, I 
would not reply ; and, accordingly, I made no further 
replies. 

After having tried, but in vain, to elicit further re- 
plies from me, the judge turned toward the jailer and 
said, "This man is commended to your charity." 
Then the jailer ordered me to follow him. 

Instead of conducting me back to my prison, he led 
me to a very small dungeon situated in the top of the 
edifice. This prison is called the chamber of proof ^ 
which had taken the place of the former system of tor- 
ture. It was situated immediately beneath the roof; 
a window toward the east, and in the centre of the 
prison, admitted the light. 

Bars of iron prevented any approach to the window, 
either to breathe the fresh air or to throw it open. 
During the excessive heat of July this prison is insup- 
portable — ^it is Hke a furnace. After sunset, the heat, 
concentrated in so small a space, rendered it still more 
intolerable, and then it was that the foul and poison- 
ous atmosphere was felt in all its horror. Add to 
this that I did not get so much water as in my other 
prison, as here they only brought to me a little cup full 
of water once a day, which I drank at a single swallow, 
and which left me more thirsty than before. I would 
rather undergo the torture of the rack than endure this 
horrible and prolonged suffering from hunger, thirst, 



236 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

heat, and pestilential air. Sentiments of rage and 
hatred arose within my heart against my infamous per- 
secutors, ^and I conceived the idea of dashing my head 
against the wall ; hut God preserved me from this ex- 
cess of despair. I prayed no longer ; I no longer be- 
lieved ; my distress had exceeded my strength, and on 
the fourth day I was reduced to such a state of weak- 
ness that the four walls of the prison appeared to turn 
around me, and I no longer knew where I was. 

While in this state I was again conducted to the 
chamber where I had undergone my first interrogatory. 
I have no recollection of what I did or said on this oc- 
casion. All that I know is that I was again question- 
ed while in this state. After that I was led back to 
my former prison, which appeared to me a palace, and 
I was again put on my former diet. 

A few days after, when I had regained a little 
strength, Father Theiner, of the congregation of Saint 
Philip Neri, was introduced into my prison. This 
man, who had been a Protestant and became a Catho- 
lic, passes for one of the best theologians of Rome ; he 
is employed to convert those accused of heresy who are 
in the hands of the Inquisition ; and when he can not 
succeed, he seeks, by the aid of promises or threats, to 
extort retractations, and each one thus obtained brings 
him one step nearer to the office of cardinal, which is 
his supreme ambition. I allowed Father Theiner to 
speak for some time without contradicting him. While 
he was speaking, a stratagem suggested itself to my 
mind by which it might be possible for me to procure 
a Bible. I appeared disposed to enter upon a discus- 
sion in all the points of controversy, but I told him 



BIBLE ALLOWED. 237 

that I begged as a great favor that I might be furnish- 
ed with a Bible to aid my memory in recalling those 
passages which appeared to me available in discussion, 
that I might thus be better able to appreciate the ex- 
planations of his reverence. Father Theiner appeared 
satisfied, and told me that he would make the demand 
of the father commissary ; accordingly, an hour had 
hardly elapsed when my jailer returned, bringing me a 
Bible in Latin, four sheets of paper, an inkstand, and 
a pen. He told me that I must account for the paper, 
lest I should amuse myself in wasting it. I could 
hardly contain my joy on finding myself in possession 
of this Bible, so longed for, and still more of materials 
for writing. The jailer had hardly left me when I 
opened with eagerness the holy book, and my eyes fell 
upon these words of Isaiah, chap. Ixi., v. 1 : " The 
Spirit of the Lord God is upon me ; because the Lord 
hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; 
he hath sent me to bind up the broken-hearted, to pro- 
claim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the 
prison to them that are bound." Hardly had I read 
these words, when I thought I felt the hand of the 
Lord applying balm to my wounds. The place no 
longer appeared a prison, and this solitude, which had 
afflicted me so much, seemed to be delightful. I pros- 
trated myself to render thanks to God ; I prayed and 
was consoled. From that moment a new life com- 
menced for me. I no longer felt my sufferings ; God 
was with me, and I no longer feared the power of man. 
To-morrow I will inform you what happened to me 
and my Bible. Meanwhile believe me yours affection- 
ately, ' Heney. 



238 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 



EIGHTEENTH LETTEE. 

Borne, May, 1849. 

My dear Eugene, — So great was my joy in pos- 
sessing a Bible that I was "beside myself while devour- 
ing its contents. 

During the rest of this day I read the five books 
of Moses, but without any benefit, because I read with- 
out proper reflection. At night I meditated in my sol- 
itude upon what I had read, but my mind was ex- 
tremely confused. The next morning I rose at the 
break of day, and returned to my reading. I told you 
that the Bible which they brought me was the Latin 
edition of the Vulgate. This edition in quarto was 
printed at Venice in 1733 by Niccolo Pezzana. I open- 
ed at the preface of the Roman edition, and my eyes 
fell by chance on these words: ''In this edition of the 
Bible many things have been changed expressly, and 
others, which apparently ought to be changed, have in- 
tentionally been left as they were." This preface is 
attributed to Pope Clement VIII., who had declared 
the Vulgate authentic ; and it is this same Pope who 
asserted that this Bible, whose authenticity he had 
guaranteed, was full of errors. Now this was no in- 
vention of the Protestants, but the confession of a 
Pope ; and it proved to me that it is wrongfully that 
the Catholics accuse the Protestants of falsifying the 
Bible, while with justice these last make the same ac- 
cusation against the Popes. 



SAINT JEEOME AND THE COUNCIL OF TEENT. 239 

Perceiving the importance of these prefaces, I con- 
tinued to read others in my Bible, and found in one, by- 
Saint Jerome, many remarkable things. For example, 
in the preface to the book of Tobit, Saint Jerome de- 
nies that it is canonical ; he makes the same remark 
in his preface to the book of Judith. In his preface 
preceding the Prophecies of Jeremiah, he says he has 
not translated the book of Baruch because it was apoc- 
ryphal. In the preface to the book of Daniel, he says 
the history of Susannah^ the hymn of the Three Chil- 
dren^ and the fables of Bel and the Dragon are apoc- 
ryphal narratives. In the preface of the books of Sol- 
omon he says that the book of Wisdom and of Eccle- 
siasticus are apocryphal. After that he says, " Since 
the Church reads the books of Judith, Tobit, and the 
Maccabees, but does not consider them as canoni- 
cal," etc. 

The perusal of this preface showed me that Saint 
Jerome, who is styled by the Catholic Church the 
greatest of doctors^ agreed precisely with the Protest- 
ants with regard to the apocryphal books. 

In these prefaces I found also the decrees of the 
fourth session of the Council of Trent, which ranks 
among the canonical books all those that Saint Jerome 
had declared apocryphal, and terminates with a solemn 
anathema against all who did not hold these books to 
be canonical. Thus the same Church excommuni- 
cates Saint Jerome which had declared him a doctor 
and a saint. 

Reading farther in these prefaces, I found a collec- 
tion of extracts from the Bible, extending over eight- 
een pages, which recommend its perusal by the pec- 



240 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

pie. This showed me how much the Eoman Church 
is in contradiction with itself and with the Word of 
God, since it forbids the perusal of it. Having read the 
prefaces, I asked myself how the Eoman Church could 
thus contradict herself, and how intelligent men, of 
whom there is such a large number among its members, 
do not perceive these contradictions. I was still per- 
plexed, when, on opening my Bible, my eyes fell upon 
the 10th verse of the second chapter of the second Epis- 
tle to the Thessalonians : "Because they received not 
the love of the truth, that they might be saved;" verse 
11: ''And for this cause God shall send them strong 
delusion, that they should believe a lie." Then my eyes 
became opened, and I saw that Mr. Pasquali could not 
have effected in a year so much as was instantaneous- 
ly wrought by the Word of God. Convinced that the 
Roman Church was in error, and that God had reveal- 
ed to me the truth, I threw myself on my knees, and 
repeated those words of Paul of Tarsus, ''Lord, what 
wilt thou have me to do?" Taking up my Bible again, 
I read in the Epistle to the Romans. The 16th verse 
of the first chapter made a profound impression on my 
mind : " The Gospel is the power of God unto salva- 
tion to every one that belie veth." Faith, then, thought 
I, is the only condition of salvation. Then I con- 
ceived the idea of transcribing the most important pas- 
sages on the under side of my table to aid my memory. 
The next day I resolved to read the whole of the New 
Testament. 

Not to be tedious, I will only say that the doctrine 
of regeneration, as exposed in the third chapter of Saint 
John, proved to me clearly that Christianity was not 



CONVERSION. 241 

a material worship, but a worship in spirit and truth. 
Although aware of the errors of the Roman Church 
from the discussions with Mr. Pasquali, yet it was the 
Bible that convinced me. I felt that I was suffering 
for Christ. 

Thus ten days were passed, during which I read 
the Bible nearly through. Its perusal furnished me 
abundant matter for reflection, and my conversion was 
complete. 

On the tenth day Father Theiner reappeared, and 
demanded of me if I was convinced of my errors, or if 
I still labored under difficulties. 

I replied that I no longer had any ; that God had 
accomplished in me the work of conversion. 

''You are then disposed to abjure your errors?" 

I replied that it was my most fervent desire, but 
that I should like to do so in public. 

Father Theiner wanted me to sign an act of retract- 
ation that he had drawn up ; but I refused to sign it 
without even looking at it ; and I told him clearly that 
the retractation that I intended to make was from the 
errors of Rome. 

He wanted to discuss with me ; but, having opened 
the Bible, I showed him these words from the 6th chap- 
ter to the Hebrews: ''For it is impossible for those 
who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the 
heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy 
Ghost, .... if they shall fall away, to renew them 
again unto repentance ; seeing they crucify to them- 
selves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open 
shame." I pronounced these words in a solemn tone, 
with my eyes fixed upon him. Then I asked him, 

L 



242 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

"Do you know of whom the apostle is speaking here?" 
His face became red, and he was full of confusion. 
Then I continued in the same tone: "He speaks of 
those who have "become apostates from the Gospel; 
He speaks of me, if I should commit such baseness ; 
He speaks of you. Father Theiner, who have been guil- 
ty of that apostacy." At this his eyes flashed with 
rage. He arose, and went out muttering menaces 
against me. 

The jailer entered, and took away my Bible and writ- 
ing materials, but he could not carry away my peace 
of conscience. 

I was never examined again ; my jailer was the 
only person who ever afterward entered my cell, and 
the only words I heard were " either retractation or 
death !" Yet my time was happily spent. The bot- 
tom of my table was covered with passages from the 
Bible, and furnished me matter for sweet meditations. 
Prayer occupied a portion of my time. The Word of 
God, which teaches that the unction of the Holy Ghost 
is alone sufficient to regenerate man, was verified in 
me (1 John, ii., 27). I examined from memory the 
doctrines of the Eoman Church, and immediately some 
passage of the Bible occurred to my mind which re- 
futed them. For example, I considered the doctrine 
of the Council of Trent which declares that the Bible 
does not contain every thing that is necessary for sal- 
vation ; but the Bible says (2d Epistle of Timothy, iii., 
15), " The holy Scriptures, which are able to make 
thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in 
Christ Jesus." With regard to the doctrine of the ob- 
scurity of the Bible, T recollected a passage of Saint 



CONVERSION. 243 

Paul (2 Cor., iv., 3), " But if our Gospel be hid, it is 
hid to them that are lost." Thus at each difficulty 
. was found a passage from the Word of God which re- 
plied to it. Twenty months of meditation and prayer 
have done more for me, I think, than twenty years 
passed in a theological seminary. 

This, my dear Eugene, is the history of my con- 
version ; but I have not been alone in receiving this 
great benefit from God. Mr. Manson and Mr. Sweet- 
man have both become converted through the instru- 
mentality of Mr. Pasquali. It is but a few moments 
since I embraced all three of them, they having just 
returned from the East. 

In my next I will describe to you the imprisonment 
of Mr. Pasquali, who experienced great sufferings ; but 
God sustained him. 

Yours truly, Henry, 



244 EOME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 



NINETEENTH LETTER 

Rome, June, 1849. 

Here I am again surrounded by my friends and in 
the height of happiness. You will desire, no doubt, to 
learn the experience of Mr. Pasquali after the account 
of my imprisonment. I wish you could hear the nar- 
rative from his own lips ; but, as that can not be, I will 
tell you, as well as I am able, what happened to him. 

As soon as my friends learned my imprisonment, 
they went directly to my chamber ; the father inquisi- 
tor and the notary were examining my papers and 
books. Mr. Pasquali was about to ask the father in- 
quisitor where I was, but he was not permitted to 
do so ; the superior of the convent obliged them to re- 
tire, telling them that they were the authors of my 
ruin. Then they called on the Swiss consul to beg 
him to demand my release. The consul is a worthy 
and excellent man, and appeared much distressed at 
what had happened. He said he would willingly in- 
terpose in the aifair, but that it would be useless. 
'-' Switzerland," said he, " is a small power, and is not 
in the least feared by the court of Rome." Then my 
friends tried, but in vain, to penetrate into the prisons 
of the Inquisition. 

One day, toward evening, Mr. Pasquali was walk- 
ing in an unfrequented street, when a well-dressed in- 
dividual met him, and, addressing him politely, said 



ENTEAPPING. 245 

that he was a great friend of the Swiss consul, whose 
house he had seen him enter ; he added that the con- 
sul had acquainted him with the fact of my imprison- 
ment, and that he could procure him an interview with 
me, adding that the present moment was exceedingly 
favorable for such a purpose. 

Mr, Pasquali, being an unsuspecting man, was easily 
persuaded, and allowed himself to be conducted by the 
stranger. They entered, therefore, both together with- 
in the walls of the palace of the Inquisition. The 
stranger went to the chamber of the father commis- 
sary, while Mr. Pasquali waited in the ante-chamber. 

After a few moments a jailer entered, and told him 
to follow, and, having opened a cell, he invited him to 
enter. Hardly had Mr. Pasquali done so when he per- 
ceived the trap laid for him, but it was too late to 
escape. They proceeded to undress him, as they had 
previously done me. 

In the mean time Mr. Sweetman and Mr. Manson 
were in great agitation ; they went to the police, but 
could obtain no news of their friend. Then they called 
upon the English consul, and as Mr. Pasquali was the 
bearer of an English passport, the consul, who under- 
stood the court of Rome, sent a note to the Secretary 
of State, asking him to account for this person, and 
the secretary replied that he would do every thing in 
his power to satisfy him. Nevertheless, days and 
weeks passed without their receiving any news of Mr. 
Pasquali. 

One day a man presented himself at Mr. Manson's, 
and said he could inform him where Mr. Pasquali could 
be found. He told him he could point out a certain 



246 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

means of saving him if he would make him a present 
of a hundred dollars, and would maintain absolute 
silence by swearing never to disclose the name of the 
person who gave him this information. Mr. Manson 
promised the hundred dollars after the truth of his 
promise should be proved. The man appeared con- 
tented, and thus it was that they discovered the place 
of Mr. Pasquali's imprisonment. 

In the mean time Mr. Pasquali had undergone a first 
interrogatory, but his examination being that of a here- 
tic, the greatest solemnity was required. The father 
commissary, Monsignior the Assessor, the father of the 
exchequer, two councilors, and a notary, were seated 
around a large table in the hall of the tribunal. Thith- 
er Mr. Pasquali was conducted, and was commanded 
to take an oath. 

" The Lord teaches us," said Mr. Pasquali, " not to 
swear at all. I am not accustomed to lie ; but I say 
yea, yea, or nay, nay. God will enable me to speak 
the truth, but I refuse to take an oath." 

The father commissary asked him to what religious 
sect he belonged. Mr. Pasquali replied in the words 
of Saint Paul, '' 'I worship the God of my fathers ;' 
concerning the profession of faith that you call a sect^ 
I believe all that is written in the Word of God ; in a 
word, I am a Christian." 

The father commissary continued, 

"You belong, then, to a sect separated from the 
Church of Christ." 

''That is false," replied the Waldensian ; " I be- 
long to the Church of Jesus Christ, and to no sect ; 
by the grace of God, I belong to a Church which has 



THE DUNGEON. 247 

existed since the time of the apostles, and has faith- 
fully preserved all their doctrines." 

Then one of the councilors asked for permission to 
speak, and entered into discussion with him. The 
eyes of Mr. Pasquali lighted up at the thought of this 
opportunity presented to him for bearing witness to 
the Gospel in the presence of Scribes and Pharisees. 

" The only Church which is the pillar and ground 
of truth is the apostolic Roman ....." 

*' Reverend father," interrupted Mr. Pasquali, '' Saint 
Paul speaks of the Church of Jesus Christ, and not of 
that of Rome. When he spake of the Church of Rome, 
he said, in addressing the Ephesians (Acts,ch. xx), 'I 
know this, that after my departure shall grievous wolves 
enter in among you, not sparing the flock. Also of 
your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse 
things, to draw away disciples after them.' It is of 
you that the apostle speaks in the 1st Epistle of Tim- 
othy, iv., 1: *Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that 
in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, 
giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils, 
speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their conscience 
seared with a hot iron.' Listen to what is written in 

the 2d Epistle to the Thessalonians " Here the 

father commissary arose, and all the rest with him, ex- 
claiming, 

''He is an obstinate heretic ! Take him away to 
the lower chamber." And Mr. Pasquali was shut up 
in a subterranean prison, excessively small, where the 
light never penetrated, and perhaps we were destined 
to be thrown together into one of those ovens I have 
described to you. 



248 ROME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

Mr. Manson being, as I told you, informed by a 
stranger, called upon the English consul, and related to 
him the imprisonment of Mr. Pasquali and the advice 
given by the stranger. 

His advice was, that the consul should demand an 
audience of the Pope, and speak to him with firmness, 
as if by order of his government ; that he should exact 
his immediate liberation, otherwise he would be obliged 
to write that very day to Lord Palmerston. Be sure, 
said he, that at this moment the name of Palmerston 
will make the Pope tremble; but, above all, let the con- 
sul himself speak to the Pope, and keep the affair se- 
cret. 

The consul put on his uniform immediately and 
went to the palace of the Pope. He entered his ante- 
chamber in a hurried manner, as if he had to make a 
communication of the highest importance. He ap- 
proached the chamberlain, and demanded an immediate 
audience, as if for a very serious affair. He obtained 
it at once, and knew so well how to act that he fright- 
ened the Pope, who promised to liberate Mr. Pasquali. 
But the consul was not content with this ; he said the 
mail would leave in an hour, and that he must write 
by the return post the positive result, consequently he 
begged his Holiness to give to him the order to liberate 
Mr. Pasquali ; for, since he was disposed to liberate 
him that day, an hour more or less would make no 
difference. The Pope wrote the order, handed it to 
the consul, who went from there to the Holy Office, 
presented the order, and exacted that Mr. Pasquali 
should be given over to him immediately. 

It was about one in the afternoon when the two 



RELEASE. 249 

friends saw the consul arrive at their hotel with Mr. 
Pasquali ! The latter, after a month's imprisonment, 
was so changed as to he hardly recognizable. 

The consul begged them to eat something while he 
was preparing their passports, and urged them to leave 
immediately for Malta, where he would send their bag- 
gage. 

"Leave immediately," said he; ''for if the Pope 
should recover from his surprise, he would be capable 
of withdrawing his consent." 

They left, therefore, recommending me to the con- 
sul, but he could do nothing for me. 

My friends then visited the East ; and now, profit- 
ing by the establishment of the Republic, they have 
returned to Eome on their way to England. 

Mr. Manson, as well from his conversations with Mr. 
Pasquali as from what he had seen, has considerably 
changed his opinion of the Roman Church ; but it was 
the treachery exercised against Mr. Pasquali, his pe- 
rusal of the Bible, and constant conversation on relig- 
ious subjects, that had converted him. 

He is still attached to the Anglican Church, but has 
entirely abandoned the new doctrines of Oxford ; and 
what contributed considerably toward leading him to 
consider the Roman Church as corrupt and degenerate 
from its principles was an occurrence which he wit- 
nessed at Jerusalem in the Church of the Holy Sepul- 
chre — an event sufficiently frequent, it is true, but which 
a Puseyite would never have believed if he had not 
seen it with his own eyes. The incident I allude to 
was the following : 

One day, while at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, 
L 2 



250 EOME, CHEISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

a monk, mounted on a ladder, was arranging a lamp, 
when a Greek priest approached, upset the ladder, 
and the monk fell. The priest fled and hid himself. 
My friends, indignant, ran to aid the fallen monk, who 
cried for help. At the same time many other brothers 
came up, and the wounded man, swearing in Italian, 
recounted the fact to his companions, exciting them to 
vengeance. The monks disappeared immediately, leav- 
ing their wounded companion; but they soon returned, 
armed with pistols, swords, and clubs, and attacked 
furiously the place where the priest had taken refuge. 
They broke down a little door which led from the 
church into the house of the Greek priests, and a hor- 
rible butchery would have taken place in the church 
itself if a company of armed janissaries had not come 
up, who, with their clubs and the butt ends of their 
guns, beat the monks back into their convent. 

This occurrence entirely cured Mr. Manson ; and 
when he learned that similar things frequently happen, 
that the Turks themselves were no longer scandalized 
by them, and that the Ottoman government was obliged 
to keep a guard of janissaries in the church to prevent 
similar quarrels between the Greek priests and Fran- 
ciscan monks ; that these monks were considered zeal- 
ous missionaries of the Eoman Propaganda, he com- 
pletely changed his idea of the Church of Rome, and no 
longer regarded it as a sister, but as an apostate Church. 

Mr. Sweetman is entirely changed and converted 
through the influence of Mr. P^squali ; the latter is 
delighted in being surrounded by his three brothers in 
Christ. He considers us his greatest consolation, and 
we regard him as our spiritual father. 



ANTICIPATIONS. 251 

I have left the house of the Roman citizen who re- 
ceived me when I was liberated, and am now living 
with my friends. I expect to leave in a few days, but 
it is undecided whither I shall go. I should like to 
return to my own country, but Mr. Pasquali wishes to 
have me with him some time longer, to instruct and for- 
tify me in the Gospel. I know not, as yet, what will 
be decided upon. We have lately made an interesting 
discovery, which I will relate to you in my next. 

Adieu, dear Eugene; by the help of God, I shall soon 
embrace you as a brother. 

Henry. 



252 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 



TWENTIETH LETTEK. 

Rome, June, 1849. 

My dear Eugene, — Our departure is decided upon; 
we shall leave to-morrow. I am going to England 
with my three friends, but we shall pass by and stop 
a few days in Geneva. I shall have so much to tell 
you, dear Eugene, when we meet ! Then I will relate 
to you in detail a history that I have only sketched in 
my letters. 

Tou will make the acquaintance of my good friends, 
and will introduce them to the good Christians of Ge- 
neva, In the mean while, let me relate to you the in- 
teresting discovery we have lately made. 

The desire having suggested itself to Mr. Manson 
to know by whom I had been denounced to the In- 
quisition, I told him that I was convinced it was by 
the father Jesuits. Mr. Pasquali also partook of this 
opinion ; but Mr. Manson, perhaps from a remaining 
affection for the Jesuits, the last trace of the influence 
of the Oxford school over him, was not convinced. 
Mr. Pasquali undertook to ascertain the fact, and for 
this purpose went to the English consul to ask him if 
it would be possible to make some researches among 
the archives of the Inquisition which had been de- 
stroyed. The consul accompanied him to the house 
of the minister Sterbini, the author of the decree for 
the abolition of the Holy Office, who, with all possible 



THE ARCHIVES. 253 

kindness, offered to escort us to the Chancery of the 
tribunal which had been destroyed. 

On the day fixed upon for this visit, we all went 
with Sterbini to this horrible palace. The subter- 
ranean prisons had been demolished, and some masons 
were converting this place of vengeance into a charita- 
ble Christian asylum ; it was being arranged to serve 
as a home for the families of the poor of Rome. 

The apartment in which the archives were kept re- 
mained, however, uninjured. '' The government," ob- 
served Mr. Sterbini, "is awaiting a favorable moment 
to give a thorough examination to these papers ; how- 
ever, I should like to show you a few things that I 
have discovered in the short time that I have devoted 
to this research." 

Then he conducted us to a closet, and took firom 
thence a letter, marked 1828, which was written by 
the Cardinal Bernetti, then Secretary of State, in which 
he begged the father commissary, in the name of the 
Pope, to aid in discovering the author of a conspiracy 
which he could not detect by means of the police. 
Appended to this letter was the decision of the tribu- 
nal, which stated that the most efficacious means for 
such discoveries was the confessional. The holy tri- 
bunal, in its tarn, begged the Pope to decree that no 
confessor could absolve a conspirator before denounc- 
ing his colleagues to the Holy Office. And as it could 
be easily proven that nearly all would refuse to de- 
nounce their relatives and friends to the Holy Office, 
the same decree established that a confessor might re- 
ceive accusations without any formality. After this 
came the Pope's brief, which, though not published. 



254 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

was made known to all confessors. Then came ten 
great volumes full of denunciations made by confes- 
sors ; and often had the artful priest employed his fe- 
rocious eloquence in persuading the dying man to de- 
nounce his friends. In this manner were denounced 
nearly all the political men of the Roman States. 
Among these denunciations was found this singular 
case: 

In 1845 the inquisitor of Pesaro sent to Eome a 
copy of certain statutes, which he supposed were those 
of a political association whose aim, said he, was to 
make recruits throughout the world, enticing them by 
diplomas to enlist. To these statutes was annexed a 
list of the names of hundreds of the first families. The 
father inquisitor expected at least to receive a cardi- 
nal's hat for this discovery. Unluckily for him, these 
statutes were in French, which language he did not 
understand. Having been examined in Rome, they 
were found to be the regulations of a certain benevo- 
lent society established in France for the relief of ref- 
ugees from all countries. 

Thence we came to another shelf containing the 
revelations, as they are called, respecting solicitations 
to evil. We would have passed it by, but Mr. Pas- 
quali desired Mr. Manson to look at these papers, in 
order to convince him still further that the confession- 
al is a mystery of iniquity. He turned over the leaves 
of these numerous volumes filled with horrible crimes : 
here a confessor had seduced a whole convent of nuns 
by means of confession, and had gotten the greater part 
of them with child ; there, a confessor at the institu- 
tion called the Conservatory of Divine Providence, 



REVELATIONS. 2o5 

under the mask of piety, had ruined sixteen of the 
most beautiful young girls ; and of similar facts there 
were thousands. 

I recollect, besides, the case of a confessor who had 
been accused seventeen times of solicitations to evil, 
but had never been punished, because he was a most 
zealous accuser of sectaries and heretics. 

Mr. Manson blushed crimson, and Mr. Sweetman 
shook with indignation ; but Mr. Pasquali, w^th his 
accustomed coolness, said, ''When you return to Ox- 
ford, tell these things to your old teacher, so that he 
may praise, as he used to do, the system of auricular 
confession." 

We begged Mr. Sterbini to show us where to find 
the papers relating to our trial. He looked at the in- 
dex of contents, and then took down from a shelf a 
large book. "Here," said he, "is your trial." We 
opened, and found a denunciation by Father P., my 
master, and a Jesuit, in which I was accused of having 
held a conversation with an English heretic. To this 
was subjoined another denunciation by the former 
servant of Mr. Manson. After the dismissal of this 
servant the Inquisition had decreed with regard to me, 
observatur^ that is to say, let him be watched. 

From this moment two individuals were charged to 
watch and report daily every thing that I did and said. 
Father M. completed this work by revealing my in- 
most thoughts. Then followed the account of my ex- 
amination, my conversations with the Fathers Pallotta 
and Theiner, and my trial ended with this decree : su- 
jpersedere donee resipiscat ; or, trial suspended until 
conversion. 



256 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

The trial of Mr. Pasquali was a consequence of 
mine ; I was accused as the seduced^ and he as the 
seducer. 

The accusers were the same. Yet as Mr. Pasquali 
was born a Protestant, was in company with English- 
men, and had an English passport, "he was to be 
arrested and punished secretly," because, as the trial 
stated, the times were difficult, and no pretext of com- 
plaint should be furnished to England. The Pope 
must appear liberal, lest England might uphold the 
Liberals. From these motives, a Roman lord, whose 
bigotry had led him to become a member of the In- 
quisition, undertook the aflfair, and arrested him as we 
have described. 

His accusation was entitled "Public dogmatist." 
To this was added his examination, and I have already 
informed you how abruptly it was ended. Well, hard- 
ly had he gone out when the "father" of the exchequer 
demanded that Pasquali, being a public dogmatist, 
should be either walled in alive or thrown into a fur- 
nace. The two advisors who then had the floor were 
in favor of th^ furnace, as the usage of walling up alive 
was too ancient. The other father companions sec- 
onded this motion. But Monsignior the Assessor 
judged differently ; he said that it was possible that 
Mr. Pasquali might some day be reclaimed, therefore 
he thought it better that he should be left for some 
time in the prisons of the tribunal, because, he added, 
if we put him to death, and later he should be reclaim- 
ed by England, the Holy Father would be very much 
irritated against us. The father commissary was of 
the same opinion, but he thought they ought to refer 



THE HOLY CHILD. 259 

the whole affair to the Pope. Thus it was that the 
fear which Lord Palmerston's name inspired in Eome 
saved the life of Pasquali. 

The account of his trial ended with the decree for 
his liberation. We thanked Mr. Sterbini, and left this 
place never to return. 

While walking home, an event occurred, slight in it- 
self, but which gives a good idea of the singular char- 
acter of the Roman people. 

A number of persons with uncovered heads, hold- 
ing in their hands lighted tapers, although it was mid- 
day, surrounded a carriage which was proceeding slow- 
ly ; the people kneeled at its passage. Although at 
some distance, we saw that the carriage was entirely 
gilded ; upon a large cushion, covered with red velvet 
embroidered with gold, was seated a coachman, dress- 
ed in red damask, having on his head an immense wig. 
Two powerful black horses, with coverings of red vel- 
vet and metal ornaments gilded, drew this mysterious 
carriage. At the four corners were placed four gilded 
vases, and behind, instead of liveried servants, were 
three wooden angels gilded, supporting the pontifical 
tiara. ''What is that ?" we asked of a man who was 
looking on indifferently. "That carriage," said he, 
" belongs to the Pope, and cost twenty-eight thousand 
dollars, and the triumvirate presented it to the Holy 
Child." We thanked the man, and llr. Pasquali asked 
me who this Santo bambino was. I informed him 
that it was a rude image of the child Jesus in the pos- 
session of the Franciscan friars, who pretended that it 
was made of olive-wood, and of the very tree against 
which Christ leaned when he was seized with a bloody 



260 ROME, CHRISTIAN AND PAPAL. 

sweat in the garden of Getlisemane. They say that 
this image was cut out by angels, and came by itself 
to Rome, and in the following way: It was one Christ- 
mas night, while the friars were chanting, that they 
heard a knock at the door of the church. As no one 
went to open it, the bells began ringing violently of 
themselves, the doors opened spontaneously, and the 
Bambino entered and took his place on the altar. 
This Bambino wears the richest dress and most pre- 
cious jewels. 

To-day, while the Roman people have permitted the 
spoliation of their churches, have scattered to the winds 
the consecrated wafers, which they believe contains 
Jesus Christ in person, merely to rob a silver vase of 
little value, not only do they not allow the pearls which 
decorate their Bamhino to be taken away, but they 
have even presented to him the most magnificent car- 
riage of the Pope. 

The Santo Bambino was being carried around to 
sick people, and is thus more honored than the holy 
sacrament itself. 

Of such singular and contradictory instances a great 
. number may be observed in Rome. Not in a letter, 
but in a large work, would it be possible to describe 
Rome as it is. 

But if my life is spared I propose to undertake such 
a work, to enlighten those who, living far from Rome, 
can have no just conception of it. When you tell 
Protestants that Rome is the Babylon of the Apoca- 
lypse, they exclaim with horror and accuse you of fa- 
naticism. But let them take in hand the Divine Word, 
and, like Mr. Pasquali, let them visit Rome with the 



CONCLUSION. 261 

Word of God in their hands and in their hearts, and 
then they will behold the truth as it is. 

Adieu, dear Eugene ; in a few days we shall be to- 
gether ; we shall embrace and love each other all the 
more since we have become brothers in Jesus Christ. 

Henry. 



THE END. 



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